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Original Article
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| Hepcidin testing; establishing reference values for the Namibian blood donor population | ||||||
| Martin Gonzo1, Aaron Maramba2, Gordon Taylor3 | ||||||
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1MSc, Lecturer, Department of Biomedical Sciences, Namibia University of Science and Technology, Windhoek, Namibia.
2PhD, Senior Lecturer, Department of Medical Laboratory Sciences, University of Zimbabwe, Harare, Zimbabwe. 3PhD, Reader, Department for Health, University of Bath, Bath, England. | ||||||
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| How to cite this article |
| Gonzo M, Maramba A, Taylor G. Hepcidin testing; establishing reference values for the Namibian blood donor population. Int J Blood Transfus Immunohematol 2017;7:1–6. |
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Abstract
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Aims:
Anemia is a global health concern affecting billions of people worldwide. The diagnostic approach to iron deficiency anemia could be streamlined in an attempt to increase diagnostic sensitivity and to reduce uncertainties in interpreting laboratory generated results. In doing so the introduction of hepcidin testing may prove to be useful but this requires the establishment of reference normal ranges. The main aim of this study was to establish reference values of hepcidin in the Namibian blood donor population which can be used as baseline or reference point in future hepcidin studies to be carried out in the same population.
Methods: In establishing the reference range, a total of 40 healthy adult participants were randomly selected from eligible blood donors in Namibia. Venous blood samples from qualifying consenting donors were collected shortly before the blood donation session. The samples were refrigerated before being spun down for storage in a –70°C freezer to maintain sample integrity. On the day of testing samples were prepared for testing using an enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) based hepcidin kit. The samples used to determine the reference values were also used determine the serum iron levels. Full blood count results were also obtained from the same participants. Results for full blood count and serum iron levels were used to confirm the absence of iron deficiency anemia. Results: In this study, serum Hepcidin reference range values for adults were established to be 17.186–91.237 ng/mL for females and 18.227–81.541 ng/mL for males Namibia blood donor population. For the entire study population, the mean hepcidin level was 51.99 ng/mL (+/-1SD 17.44 ng/mL). Mean hemoglobin and serum iron values were 143.56 g/L (+/-1SD 12.92g/L) and 91.32 mg/dL (+/-1SD 16.77 mg/dL) respectively indicating iron adequacy in this non-anemic study population. Conclusion: The established reference ranges are comparable to those determined elsewhere. These values can, therefore, be used as baseline values for studies on hepcidin in Namibia. | |
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Keywords:
Anemia, Blood donors, Hepcidin, Iron deficiency
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Author Contributions:
Martin Gonzo – Substantial contributions to conception and design, Acquisition of data, Analysis and interpretation of data, Drafting the article, Revising it critically for important intellectual content, Final approval of the version to be published Gordon Taylor – Substantial contributions to conception and design, Revising it critically for important intellectual content, Final approval of the version to be published Aaron Maramba – Analysis and interpretation of data, Revising it critically for important intellectual content, Final approval of the version to be published |
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Guarantor of submission
The corresponding author is the guarantor of submission. |
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Source of support
None |
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Conflict of interest
Authors declare no conflict of interest. |
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Copyright
© 2017 Martin Gonzo et al. This article is distributed under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium provided the original author(s) and original publisher are properly credited. Please see the copyright policy on the journal website for more information. |
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