Abstract
Anemia is one of the most common problems encountered in general practice. Very little is known about the prevalence of anemia in the elderly.
To estimate the prevalence of anemia in an elderly population from Saudi Arabia.
Razi polyclinic Umalhamam, Riyadh.
A total of 1558 elder subjects were involved in these studies, and 150 control healthy subjects of similar age and gender were included in these studies.
The prevalence of anemia in an elder population of both women and men of Saudi is 12.9%.
Commonly used hematological indices were determined in an elder group of subjects over 60 years old. A total of 201 (12.9%) out of 1558 elders were found to have anemia: 154 (9.9%) had moderate anemia, and 47 (3.1%) severe anemia. A higher frequency of anemia was observed in women (18%) with 13.9% subjects having moderate anemia and 4.1% subjects having severe anemia. In men, anemia was observed in 5.06% of patients (moderate [3.87%] and severe [1.31%]). In an analysis comparing moderate and severe anemia, red blood cell indices were found to be significantly higher frequency with a p-value (p<0.001) for all red blood cell indices.
It can be concluded that anemia in the elderly is an extremely common problem and found more often in women than in men and is associated with increased mortality and poorer health-related quality of life in this group of the population of Saudi Arabia.