Epidemiological, clinical, and laboratory profile of anemia in elderly population in North India

Background: Over the past decade, anemia has emerged as a risk factor that is associated with a variety of adverse outcomes in older adults including hospitalization, disability, and mortality.Limited such literature is available in the local population.Methods: A single-center cross-sectional study was done after enrolling 50 elderly patients with anemia.Results: The study showed a male preponderance (56%) with a majority of patients in the age group 65-69 years (46%).The most common symptoms were fatigue (82%) and anorexia (64%).Normocytic normochromic anemia was the most common type (60%), followed by microcytic hypochromic anemia (36%).In patients with normocytic normochromic anemia, anemia of chronic disease (36.67%) was the most common cause followed by anemia of renal disease (33.33%).Among microcytic hypochromic anemia cases, irondeficiency anemia was the most common cause (72.22%).Overall, the most common cause of anemia was anemia of chronic disease (32%), followed by iron-deficiency anemia (26%), and anemia of chronic kidney disease (20%).Conclusion: Failure to evaluate and diagnose anemia including ignorance of non-specific symptoms such as fatigue and weakness in the elderly could lead to delayed diagnosis of potentially treatable conditions.An effort should always be made to reach an etiological diagnosis before instituting specific therapy.