Tài liệu Báo cáo y học: "Identification of clinical and simple laboratory variables predicting responsible ga

Iron deficiency anemia (IDA) remains the most common cause of anemia and affects about 5–12% of nonpregnant women and 1–5% of men have IDA [1-2]. It is a result of blood loss from the gastrointestinal tract or the uterus and is a requiring further investigation due to sign of serious underlying disease. While menstrual blood loss is the commonest cause of IDA in pre-menopausal women, blood loss from the gastrointestinal (GI) tract is the commonest cause in adult men and post-menopausal women [3-6]. Laboratory tests used to make the diagnosis have not changed in many decades, their interpretation has, and this is possibly due to the availability of extensive testing in key populations. A loss of 10 ml of blood per day is usually required for a positive based fecal occult blood test (FOBT), although FOBT posi-tivity is highly dependent on the locus of the bleeding source. Bleeding lesions in the GI tract are identified in about 50% of patients with IDA [7-8].