The red blood cells are responsible for transporting oxygen from lungs to different tissues. When for any reason reduces the number of red blood cells, also decreases the oxygen supply to the various organs of our body, causing the sensation of fatigue so characteristic of anemia.
1. When to see a doctor?
The main symptom of anemia is fatigue, but it may manifest in other ways, such as weakness, pallor and irritability.
Sometimes that lack of oxygen in the tissues of the body itself compensates by increasing the rate of blood circulation, causing mild tachycardia and blood pressure rises. You can also accelerate the process of making oxygen, manifesting wheezing and rapid breathing.
Other symptoms of anemia: dizziness, insomnia, chest pain, numbness or coldness in hands and feet and headaches. These symptoms can be mild, but as they also worsen the disease worse.
Of course, before a significant loss of blood, we should also see a doctor to determine whether this lack of hemoglobin can cause hypoxia, lack of tissue oxygenation.
2. Types of anemia
We can distinguish various types of anemia:
- Deficiency: They occur when the patient does not have any vitamin or, in the normal case, enough iron to maintain the level of red blood cells.
- For hematologic disease: leukemias, lymphomas, myelomas … We must watch with great interest the anemia, as can be the first symptom of a disease much more transcendent, like a cancer.
- Chronic disorders: Hypothyroidism, hyperthyroidism or rheumatic diseases cause a decreased efficiency in transporting oxygen.
- For bleeding: When you lose blood, if a reasonable amount, it is normal that the body itself is able to regenerate lost red blood cells without any problems, but there is a possibility that can not make alone. In this situation, the body will begin to manifest symptoms of anemia.
- Congenital: there are cases where the evil is in the patient’s bone marrow, which is able to generate enough red blood cells to replace those destroyed, among others, in the spleen, despite having all raw materials needed for this.
3. Diagnostic Criteria
Once the doctor finds symptoms of anemia, a blood test charge. One sample will be submitted for Gram stain, used to be able to fix and distinguish the number, type and form of the items through a microscope.
Thus, the expert laboratory may perform a CBC-quantification and evaluation of different cell groups, which then cross-checked with the levels set as normal.
Anemia is defined as a decrease in normal levels of hemoglobin, which is the substance found inside red blood cells, providing its characteristic color to the blood and acting as a carrier of oxygen.
Anemia was considered when hemoglobin levels are below 16 + / -2 g / dL in men and 14 + / -2 g / dL in women.
The physician will pay attention to level of thyroid hormones, which reflects the possibility that the patient has hyper-or hypothyroidism, the vitamin B-12 and folic acid, necessary for the absorption of iron, and a study of one’s level of iron in blood.
Iron is essential for the production of red blood cells to get the body has two sources: the nutritional and RBC recycling “old” to become new red blood cells in the bone marrow.
Finally, the doctor, if you suspect the existence of anemia, review the patient’s medical history and ask about possible family history references, as sometimes the tendency to anemia is inherited.
Tags: Anemia, red blood cells, symptom of anemia, Types of anemia
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