[Detection and treatment of iron deficiency anaemia coexisting with inflammation prevalent in aged individuals].

As the author found that serum ferritin is decreased below 12 ng/ml in iron deficiency anemia (IDA) even then it is coexisting with anaemia other than IDA, an attempt was made to detect and treat IDA coexisting with anaemia other than IDA. When surveyed in a general hospital admitting 222 patients, anaemias were detected in 95 out of 190 patients aged above 60:82 inflammation anaemia, 9 IDA including 6 cases with inflammation and 4 other anaemias. According to the above results, aged patients above 60 with IDA only and IDA coexisting with inflammation were treated by injecting iron intravenously. By the treatment, haemoglobin (Hb) was increased from 9.0 to 13.8 g/dl and the ratio of Hb increase was 0.59 in 4 patients with IDA only, and Hb was increased from 7.7 to 11.5 g/dl and the ratio of Hb increase was 0.63 in 18 patients with IDA coexisting with inflammation. After the treatment, general disease states were improved in many cases. Thus, the treatment of aged patients with IDA coexisting with inflammation seems to be comparably effective as for IDA only.