The rate fluctuates depending on the age of life but it should not be too low.
Hemoglobin is a blood protein that is part of the composition of blood, giving it its red color. Hemoglobin is responsible for balancing the balance between oxygen and carbon dioxide within cells. This protein contains iron, a micronutrient provided by our diet. Many factors influence the blood hemoglobin level: in excess, we speak of polycythemia and when the level is abnormally low, it is anemia.
Normal values are 12 g/dl in women and 13 or 14 in men. These rates fluctuate according to periods of life, during pregnancy for example or with age. “A level below 10 g/dl raises questions, something may be poorly tolerated in the patient”explains Dr Sophie Bauer, surgeon and president of the SML. “Below 8 g/dl, we act with treatment. Below 6 g/dl, the patient is unwell,” she adds. Several causes can explain a low hemoglobin level:
► An infection: “Bacteria consume iron, but iron is necessary to have red blood cells loaded with hemoglobins. Severe infections can cause severe inflammatory anemia.”
► A hemorrhage: “It may be an externalized hemorrhage such as melena (very black stools because they are loaded with digested blood, upper digestive bleeding resulting in bloody vomiting. It may also be a direct loss of blood , during a hemorrhage from a nosebleed for example. The blood at the back of the throat is swallowed, so the bleeding is not immediately visible.
► Frustrated bleeding: the blood does not come out obviously, but the patient bleeds a little as the water passes. Frustrating bleeding occurs, for example, when there is blood in the stool, polyps or a tumor. After a while, anemia is possible.
► Abnormally heavy periods. “It is a major cause of anemia in women.”
► A uterine fibroid: “It presents in the form of very heavy periods, which sometimes appear after menopause (we no longer speak of periods in this case), hence the importance of being followed by a gynecologist.”
► A dysfunction of the spleen, an organ which begins to digest or sequester red blood cells, causing them to fall.
► Chemotherapy treatments or cancers affecting the bone marrow are also possible causes of anemia.
► Thalassemia, hereditary diseases causing abnormalities in the shape of red blood cells. “These diseases create crises of destruction of red blood cells, causing acute anemia. They are mainly present on the African continent. There are two forms of this congenital disease: minor and major, where patients are very anemic. There is also a partial form, allowing the disease to progress, even creating a kind of resistance to malaria”, continues the doctor.
When the drop in hemoglobin is linked to iron deficiency anemia, the main symptom is fatigue. Asthenia sets in and persists despite sleep and rest. Iron deficiency anemia also causes shortness of breath on exertion, dizziness, general weakness, pale complexion and a feeling of “dizziness”. If the drop in hemoglobin occurs in the context of an acute infection, tissue oxygenation is insufficient. Cellular respiration does not occur correctly: the tissues are poorly oxygenated. The patient then has difficulty maintaining consciousness.