ADVANCES IN MANAGING ANEMIA IN ELDERLY IN PRIMARY CARE

Introduction: Anemia is considered to be important risk factors that lead to the development of several late complications and morbidities especially in the elderly. It is associated with higher rates of hospital admissions worse survival outcomes. Most studies have concluded that the risk of anemia continues to increase after an individual passes fifty years of age, with a prevalence of more than twenty percent in individuals older than eighty-five years. it is important to establish the best ways to approach anemic elderly patients and to determine best work-up methodsAim of work: In this review, we will discuss the most recent approaches for management of anemia in the elderly, with a focus on transfusion therapy.Methodology: We did a systematic search for anemia in elderly in the emergency department using PubMed search engine (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/) and Google Scholar search engine (https://scholar.google.com). We only included full articles.Conclusions: Anemia is considered to be one of the most common conditions present in the elderly population. anemia can range from mild, to moderate, or even severe in some cases. Most cases off anemia can be asymptomatic and detected accidentally prior to surgeries or on routine investigations. we discussed indications for blood transfusion in anemic elderly patients. Further studies are still required to determine the thresholds for blood transfusion in each subgroup of patients.

Key words: Anemia, elderly, management, recent advances