ABSTRACT
Background: Sickle cell disease (SCD) patients have mechanisms that are thought to protect them more than apparently normal individuals from iron deficiency. However, evidence exists that in SCD, hypoferritinaemia may be more prevalent than hyperferitinaemia, especially in developing countries. Methods: Serum ferritin (SF) levels were measured - using an ELISA based kit (Biocheck, USA), and disease severity calculated in fifty- two asymptomatic steady state (ASS) SCD patients; who were iron chelation naive and both parameters correlated. Erythrocyte morphology and malaria parasitaemia were assessed, patients with parasitaemia were excluded. 64 apparently normal individuals in the same environment and socioeconomic group were also assessed as above and served as controls. Statistical analysis was done using SPSS version 20. Results were expressed as means and standard error of mean. Level of significance was set at p= 0.05. Results: 30.7% and 7.6% of the test subjects had hypoferritinaemia and hyperferritinaemia respectively compared to controls, where 56% had hypoferritinaemia and none had hyperferritinaemia. Erythrocyte morphology showed hypochromia and microcytosis to different degrees in all test subjects assessed: 1+ (10.5%), 2+ (63.2%) and 3+ (26.3%), while only 5% of controls had hypochromia and microcytosis. Blood transfusion and age did not seem to significantly affect SF levels (p= 0.65 and 0.93) respectively. SF levels increased progressively with disease severity but didn’t reach statistical significance (p=0.29). Conclusion: The results suggest that hypoferritinaemia is more prevalent than hyperferitinaemia, and that SF levels may be a useful index for computing an objective severity score in SCD management. Anaemia of chronic inflammation may cause a significant part of the anaemia in SCD.
ABSTRACT
Aim: With increasing urbanization of lifestyle; cardiovascular morbidity and mortality have been on the increase in Africans. Studies on cardiovascular risk factors in rural communities in South East Nigeria are scarce. This study focused on hypertension and obesity in adult Nigerians dwelling in a rural setting in Eastern Nigeria. Materials and Methods: A total of 218 participants from the rural community were recruited into the study. A questionnaire was used to assess prior knowledge of their weight and blood pressure status as well as drug history for those found to have ypertension. Each participant's blood pressure was measured and any value =140/90 mmHg was regarded as high blood pressure (HBP). Their heights and weights were measured and their body mass indices (BMI) calculated using the standard formula of BMI = Weight in Kg/Height in m 2 ; BMI =30 Kg/m 2 was referred to as global obesity. Their waist circumferences (WC) were also measured and any value =102 cm for males and =88 cm for females was regarded as abdominal obesity. Results: The general prevalence of HBP in the rural community was 44.5. The prevalence of HBP increased as age increased and awareness about HBP was low (15.2). Females were more aware than the males. The prevalence of HBP was higher in males (49.3) compared with their female counterparts (42.3); whereas the females had a higher prevalence of all forms of obesity (abdominal: 36.2; global: 14.8) compared with the males (abdominal: 14.5; global: 10.1). Higher BMI was associated with higher systolic and diastolic BP values. Hypertensive participants had higher BMI and WC than those who had normal BP. Conclusion: The prevalence of both hypertension and obesity seems to be increasing in rural communities in Nigeria and thus; the available prevalence documented in previous studies for rural communities may no longer represent the current trend. Awareness of the participants about these major cardiovascular risk factors is still very low. Higher BMI was associated with higher values of both systolic and diastolic BP