Collaborative Study of the Hemoglobin Repletion Test in Chicks and Rats for Measuring Availability of Iron

Abstract

Abstract The widespread incidence of iron deficiency anemia caused by insufficient iron intake and poor utilization of dietary iron sources prompted the search for a method which would be a reliable measure of availability. A hemoglobin repletion method has been proposed and studied collaboratively with 8 participating laboratories. The collaborators reported chick or rat data on the availability of supplemental iron from 5 uniform sources. There was very good agreement between collaborators. Expressed as relative biological values, versus ferrous sulfate = 100, the results on the other 4 samples were as follows: Sample 2 = 12±0.9; Sample 3 = 13±7.7; Sample 4 = 46±17.9; and Sample 5 = 3±4.5. Increases in plasma iron in human volunteers, following test doses of these samples, ranked these 5 samples in the same order as did the chick and rat hemoglobin repletion test. It is recommended that the hemoglobin test for measuring availability of iron be adopted as official first action.