Published Paper Details:

Megaloblastic anaemia has been recognized as a clinical entity forever a century. The first clinical description of pernicious anaemia, which is one of the known causes of megaloblastic anaemia, has been attributed to Thomas Addison in 1849. Anaemia is the most common problems encountered by clinicians in INDIA. The affected population includes male, female as well as children. Over the last two decades, it has been found that incidence of megaloblastic anaemia is increasing. Folic Acid and Vitamin B12 deficiency are the most common cause of megaloblastic anemia. Of these two micronutrients, Vitamin B12 deficiency is more common now, due to vegetarian life style of people. At present, Anemia control or prophylaxis program give only Iron and Folic acid. This study has been chosen to focus on this issue. The cases for increasing incidences of Folate / Vit. B12 deficiency needs to be elucidated. For a number of years, the disease was known as Addisoniananaemia6. Megaloblastic anaemiais a heterogeneous group of disorders that have common blood abnormalities and symptoms. All patients presenting to hospital over a period of 2 months with a haemoglobin <10 g/dl and peripheral smear findings consistent with megaloblastic anaemia will be included in the study. Diet, drug intake, previous blood transfusion, presenting symptoms and other relevant history will be taken into consideration. Complete blood counts, peripheral film examination, reticulocyte count and cobalamin and folate assays will be recorded. Patients with chronic disease like renal disease, cancer, tuberculosis, liver disease etc. will be excluded from the study. All data will be collected and evaluated statistically. Total 100 patients were diagnosed as macrocytic anaemia. The sex distribution were-70(male), 30(female) All the patients were vegetarian and from middle class and low socio economic group Most of the patients were found to be vegetarian. Even those who consider themselves as non-vegetarians usually consume meat only occasionally. Megaloblastic anaemia seen in infants and young children may be attributed to maternal deficiency which results in poor body stores at the time of birth. Cobalamin content of breast milk is lower in vegetarian mothers and is directly proportional to serum cobalamin levels. Cobalamin deficiency was responsible for megaloblastic anaemia in the majority of our patients. The supplementation program for Anemia control and prophylaxis should vary according to the regional requirements. Vitamin B12 should be included in the nutritional programme along with iron and folic acid. Awareness camp and Education program about megaloblastic anemia can be implemented for the prevention.