All issues > Volume 33(10); 1990

Original Article

J Korean Pediatr Soc. 1990;33(10):1374-1379. Published online October 31, 1990.

Whole Cow's milk Related iron Deficiency Anemia in Early Childhood.

In Sang Jeon¹, Heon Seok Han¹, Hyo Seop Ahn¹, Jin Q Kim²

¹Department of Pediatrics, Seoul National University, College of Medicine, Seoul, Korea
²Department of Clinical Pathology, Seoul National University, College of Medicine, Seoul, Korea

Received: February 6, 1990;  Accepted: June 11, 1990.

Abstract

To study the relationship between large amount of whole cow’s milk (WCM) intake and iron deficiency anemia (IDA) in early childhood, we carried out the study on 9 children with IDA, who were fed WCM, about 1,000 ml over 3 months, experienced at the department of Pediatrics, Seoul National University Hospital, during 5 months from March 1989 to July 1989. The results were as follows: 1) The sex ratio of male to female was 5:4. The age of patients ranged from 1 year 2 months to 3 years 1 month and the median was 2 years 1 month. 2) The age at WCM commencing was from 3 months to 1 year 3 months old of age. The daily amount of WCM was from 850 ml to 1,500 ml, and the duration of WCM feeding was from 3 months to 2 years 10 months. 3) The average concentration of Hb was 7.2 gm/dl (2.8—10.6 gm/dl). The average Het was 27.4% (11.1 〜 37.4%). 4) The average concentration of serum ferritin was 5.8 ng/ml (3.0—16.0 ng/ml). That of serum iron was 48.3 z/g/dl (26~ 120 ^g/dl). The average TIBC was 448.4 jtzg/dl (375〜496//g/dl). The average transferrin saturation was 10.9% (5.5〜27.9%). 5) The concentration of iron in H & S company WCM at the market was 0.5 mg/1 and 0.7 mg/Z by the Bathophenanthroline method. 6) There was an improvement in Hb concentration over 10 gm/dl after WCM restriction under 500 ml/day and oral iron therapy in 7 observed cases.

Keywords :Iron deficiency anemia, Whole cow’s milk, Weaning