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Common Anemia Types
”“Iron Deficiency Anemia
Anemia is the most common blood disorder which is caused by deficiency of iron. According to medical statistics, 60 percent of women in the child-bearing ages from 19 to 44 have Iron Deficiency Anemia in Taiwan.
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Syndrome
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”@Patients have pale appearance, frequent palpitations, dyspnea, dizziness and fatigue. In addition to general syndromes, patients would have spoon-shaped and fragile fingernails as well as dry tongues. Those are caused by iron deficiency which leads to lack of oxygen in peripheral tissue. |
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Diagnosis
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”@You can check iron concentration and blood cell counts. Normal Hgb (Hemoglobin, Hb) of adult men should be around 169/dl. One cubic cg (Centigram) contains around five million blood cells. Patients with anemia have less than this number. Then, pale eyelid conjunctiva is also one way to identify. However, sometimes anemic patients with conjunctivitis would have inflammation and redness over conjunctiva, checking oral mucosa may also be necessary to help to identify this disorder. |
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Precaution
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”@When having iron deficiency anemia, patients should be aware of hemorrhage caused by stomach (gastric) ulcer, stomach cancer or hemorrhoids. Female patients should take care of uterine myoma and uterine endometrial cancer. If not having any features as above, the possible cause may be the unbalanced diet or malnutrition. Patients should have more animal livers, Sargassum, clams, and dried fish that contain rich in iron. |
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Treatment
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”@Iron Deficiency Anemia is seldom harmful to the human bodies. However, long-term neglect also possibly causes severe conditions such as cardiomegaly and heart failure. Iron deficiency anemia can be cured with iron supplement. Iron supplement can be taken by oral intake and injection. Oral intake is more frequent prescription. Patients should accept blood inspection regularly to see if any improvement of body conditions. |
”“Thalassaemia
Thalassaemia is hereditary disease. Patients take up around 6 to 8 percent of Taiwan population. Pre-marriage health checkup is one important way to avoid bearing children with severe thalassaemia.
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Treatment
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”@Thalassaemia is caused by hereditary chromosomal abnormality. Patients's RBCs have shorter life span than normal peoples'do. Premature breakup of unstable RBC in thalassaemia patients would release iron and cause anemia with high iron load. Patients with high iron load would have iron precipitated in the liver, pancreas, bone marrow and other parts of the body that is so-called hemochromatosis.
”@Therefore, patients with thalassaemia shall avoid iron-containing foods and medicines in daily diets to prevent further harm to those organs. Complete cure of severe thalassaemia is bone marrow transplantation. However, the transplant would be effective with healthy and right tissue match. Patients have no right matches could only control the syndrome by regular blood transfusion and Desferoxamine (iron-chelating agent) injection. |
”“ Pernicious Anemia
Pernicious anemia is one of megaloblastic anemia caused by dystrophy.
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Syndromes
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”@People over 40 years old tend to have pernicious anemia easily. General syndromes are pale look, palpitations, dyspnea and tiredness. Severe syndromes are redness and glittering tongues as well as pain, burning sensation and anorexia. That's because stomach secretion is decreasing when aging so as to cause ill implantation of Vitamin B12. Lack of Vitamin B12 causes decrease of red blood cells and increase of macrocyte formation. Patients with gastric ulcer or stomach cancer often tend to have pernicious anemia. |
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Diagnosis
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”@Do microscopy of blood to detect blood types and numbers. |
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Treatment
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”@Pernicious anemia is caused by lack of Vitamin B12 and folic acid. First step of treatment is to find out cause of lack in Vitamin B12 and folic acid. If the cause comes from imbalanced diets, changing diet habit is the key to treatment.
”@Elderly patients or those who once had gastric operation need to take Vitamin B12 and folic acid to improve supplementation of Vitamins. They may have poor absorption of Vitamins because of insufficient secretion of intrinsic factors of stomach.
”@In addition, female patients during pregnancy also need to take Vitamin B12 and folic acid under doctors' instruction. |
”“Aplastic anemia
Bone marrows function to product various blood cells to supply regular consumption. Low blood cell production ability of bone marrows would cause aplastic anemia.
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Syndromes
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”@Aplastic anemia is caused by few blood cells including red blood cells, platelets and white blood cells, resulting from inability of blood formation of bone marrows. There is still no clear discovery toward the cause of primary aplastic anemia. Secondary aplastic anemia is caused by medication or radioactive rays.
”@Patients look pale because of reduction red blood cells, but they don't have palpitations or dyspnea. Patients would also get cold easily because of lack in white blood cells. They would have hemorrhage (bleeding) in noses, mouths and gastro intestinal tracts and more petechiae on the body because of lack in platelets. |
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Diagnosis
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”@If you found decrease of those blood cells when doing blood examination, you shall have this kind of disease. Those syndromes are similar to cirrhosis; to ensure the right result, you have to check items of iron metabolism and life span of red blood cells (RBCs). |
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Treatment
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”@Recently, medication treatment gradually replaces blood transfusion. However, severe aplastic anemia still needs treatment of blood transfusion. Due to hepatitis which is mainly caused by blood transfusion, medication and bone marrow transplant have become the main treatment. Besides anticoagulants, Adrenocorticotropic Hormone (ACTH), immunosuppression medication and male hormone all can help to control this disease. However, those medicines above all have certain side effects. Therefore, patients should take those under doctors' instruction. |
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”“Hemolytic anemia
Life span of red blood cells is around 120 days. People who may have hemolytic anemia under either condition that red blood cells are destroyed much in the blood vessels or tissues, or new red blood cells cannot resupply immediately. Hemolytic anemia is divided into congenital and acquired types.
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Syndromes
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”@General syndromes contain pale look, dizziness, palpitations, dyspnea and tiredness. In addition, patients may also have jaundice (yellowish conjunctiva and skin appearance). Severe syndromes may have red urine (hematuria).
”@The disease is caused by shorten life span of red blood cells. The disease is caused by the condition that speed of blood cell formation in bone marrow cannot keep up with breakup of red blood cells. It may cause complication of gallstones and jaundice. The disease mainly belongs to heredity with many types. |
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Diagnosis
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”@Life span of red blood cells is around 120 days. Patients' red blood cells may be died earlier. The disease can be diagnosed by seeing if there is large increase of new red blood cells (RBCs) or increase of bilirubin in peripheral blood smear. |
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Treatment
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”@If acquired hemolytic anemia is caused by medication, main treatment is to stop this medication. If it is caused by some other underlying disease, treatment is focus on chemotherapy and underlying disease control.
Congenital anemia can be controlled by Adrenocorticotropic Hormone (ACTH) if the anemia is self-immune related; patients may have to excise spleen when under severe conditions.
”@Hemolytic disease of newborn babies need exchange blood transfusion to remove the antibody of RBCs to protect babies' lives. |
”“Anemia caused by hemorrhage
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Syndromes
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”@It is the most common anemia type in Taiwan. Massive bleeding causes a large amount of blood loss that result in acute anemia. Long-term continuous bleeding or persistent and recurrent bleeding such as ulcer in stomach and intestines, gastric and GI tract cancers or menorrhagia. All those lead to chronic anemia. |
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Treatment
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”@No matter acute or chronic anemia caused by hemorrhage, you have to find out bleeding sites of your body and have hemostasis treatment. Patients with massive acute bleeding need to be controlled by blood transfusion of either fresh or storage blood products. When being under emergency or having no same-type blood for transfusion, you can use plasma transfusion or intravenous drips of Ringer's solution or normal saline. |
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