We found a match
Your institution may have access to this item. Find your institution then sign in to continue.
- Title
Reticulocyte hemoglobin equivalent as a marker to assess iron deficiency: A large pediatric tertiary care hospital study.
- Authors
Poventud‐Fuentes, Izmarie; Chong, Thomas H.; Dowlin, Michael; Devaraj, Sridevi; Curry, Choladda V.
- Abstract
Introduction: Detection of iron deficiency (ID) remains challenging. We aimed to evaluate the performance of reticulocyte hemoglobin equivalent (Ret‐He) as a potential diagnostic marker to assess ID and iron deficiency anemia (IDA) in a large pediatric cohort. Methods: A total of 3158 patients (aged 15 days to 19 years with a median age of 8.5 years; 60.2% female) were retrospectively studied. Statistical analysis was performed (a) to evaluate relationship of Ret‐He with other relevant complete blood count and iron panel parameters; (b) to compare the levels of Ret‐He in ID and IDA groups to a control group; and (c) to assess sensitivity and specificity of Ret‐He in ID, IDA, and anemia without ID groups. Results: Ret‐He values were significantly positively correlated to ferritin and transferrin saturation (TSAT). The median Ret‐He was significantly lower in ID. A Ret‐He cutoff of ≤30.0 pg distinguished cases of ID from the control group with a sensitivity of 90.2%, specificity of 59.5%, and area under curve (AUC) of 0.88. Ret‐He showed better diagnostic performance in the IDA group and acceptable performance for ID without anemia. The sensitivity, specificity, and AUC were 90.1%, 80.9%, and 0.93 for IDA at cutoff value of ≤27.4 pg, and 80.8%, 51.1%, and 0.70 for ID without anemia at cutoff value of ≤30.8 pg, respectively. Conclusion: Our large pediatric tertiary care hospital study demonstrates that Ret‐He is a reliable marker to help confirm IDA in pediatric population. However, further studies are needed for its use to capture the early stages of ID.
- Subjects
BIOMARKERS; STATISTICS; RETICULOCYTES; HEMOGLOBINS; TRANSFERRIN; IRON; FERRITIN; RETROSPECTIVE studies; IRON in the body; COMPARATIVE studies; DESCRIPTIVE statistics; IRON deficiency; RESEARCH funding; IRON deficiency anemia; DATA analysis; BLOOD cell count; SENSITIVITY &; specificity (Statistics); CHILDREN
- Publication
International Journal of Laboratory Hematology, 2024, Vol 46, Issue 1, p148
- ISSN
1751-5521
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1111/ijlh.14188