Hepcidin and conventional markers to detect iron deficiency in severely anaemic HIV-infected patients in Malawi.

Introduction: Iron deficiency is a treatable cause of severe anaemia in low-and-middle-income-countries (LMIC). Diagnosing it remains challenging as peripheral blood markers poorly reflect bone-marrow iron deficiency (BM-ID), especially in the context of HIV-infection. Methods: Severe anaemic (haemoglobin ≤70g/l) HIV-infected adults were recruited at Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital, Blantyre, Malawi. BM-ID was evaluated. Accuracy of blood markers including hepcidin alongside mean corpuscular volume, mean cellular haemoglobin concentration, serum iron, serum ferritin, soluble transferrin receptor (sTfR), sTfR -index, sTfR –ratio to detect BM-ID was valued by ROC area under the curve (AUCROC ). Results: Seventy-three patients were enrolled and 35 (48.0%) had BM-ID. Hepcidin and MCV performed best; AUCROC of 0.593 and 0.545. Other markers performed poorly (ROC<0.5). The AUCROC of hepcidin in males was 0.767 (sensitivity 80%, specificity 78%) and in women 0.490 (sensitivity 60%, specificity 61%). Conclusion: BM-ID deficiency was common in severely anaemic HIV-infected patients and is an important and potential treatable contributor to severe anaemia. Hepcidin was the best, though still suboptimal, marker of BM-ID. Hepcidin, which is directly linked to iron absorption, is a very promising marker to guide curative iron supplementation policies in severely anaemic HIV-infected patients.