Can anemia be cured by taking blood-enriching medicine? Don't take iron randomly, it may be caused by tumors

1. As the chief examiner of the health management center, you often encounter such problems:

1. Doctor, my recent physical examination showed that I have anemia. Could you prescribe some blood-enriching medicine?

2. Doctor, I feel dizzy every day. Do you think I have anemia?

3. Doctor, my child is white and plump, how could he have anemia?

4. Doctor, I just have anemia, why do you insist on having me do a gastroscopy? And so on. There are many such questions.

Many people actually think that anemia is very common and ordinary, and that it can be cured by taking some medicine. Is anemia really that simple and can be cured by taking some medicine?

Second, let me tell you a story:

Two years ago, a male patient was found to have moderate anemia in his blood during a physical examination at another hospital. He did not take it seriously and ate peanuts and red dates to "replenish blood". Two years later, he was obviously weak and uncomfortable, and felt anxious and tight in the chest. He was admitted to the cardiology department. The blood routine test showed severe anemia during hospitalization, and he was later diagnosed with "colon cancer". It turned out that the anemia was caused by colon cancer.

Therefore, anemia should not be taken lightly. Because anemia can reduce the body's immune level and lead to repeated infectious diseases. It can damage multiple organs in the body, especially the heart, and even cause arrhythmia or sudden death. Anemia may also collude with malignant tumors, and there may be many crises hidden behind anemia.

3. The question is, in life, how do we know if we are anemic?

Just see if you often:

1. Lack of energy, with varying degrees of palpitations, shortness of breath, or chest tightness;

2. If the brain tissue is deprived of oxygen, anemic patients will experience headaches, dizziness, insomnia, nightmares, tinnitus, memory loss, inattention, etc.;

3. You may suffer from loss of appetite, bloating, nausea, constipation, diarrhea, etc. If so, it should attract our attention.

4. We have an even simpler way. Please stretch out your hands and look at the color of your nails, then look at each other's lips and lower eyelids. If they are rosy, you should not have anemia.

5. Of course, scientific and accurate diagnosis still requires going to the hospital. Many anemia patients will visit different departments due to different symptoms, such as cardiology, neurology, gastroenterology... The patient mentioned above was admitted to the cardiology department because of palpitations.

6. In addition to asking about medical history and physical examination, the necessary examinations are blood routine and reticulocytes. Then the doctor will selectively perform the following examinations according to the condition, such as three anemia tests, liver and kidney function, bone marrow puncture, chest and abdominal CT, gastrointestinal endoscopy...

4. How to diagnose anemia through routine blood tests?

Whether you have anemia or not can be checked at a glance by doing a blood test. Anemia depends on an important indicator in the blood test: the level of hemoglobin. Hemoglobin can carry oxygen. If it is low, various tissues and organs of the human body will show signs of hypoxia.

Chinese hematologists believe that anemia occurs when the hemoglobin level in adult males (often represented by Hb on test results) is less than 120 g/L and that in adult females (non-pregnant women) is less than 110 g/L.

The World Health Organization (WHO) defines anemia in people over 65 years old as: hemoglobin <130 g/L for men and <120 g/L for women.

Red blood cells are divided into four categories according to their size, and anemia is divided into four degrees according to the severity of hemoglobin. Hemoglobin values ​​vary according to age and gender. Finally, the cause of the disease is found and the right medicine is prescribed.

The main causes of the disease are: blood disease, malignant tumors, chronic infection, rheumatic disease, kidney disease, liver disease, pituitary or thyroid dysfunction, etc. At least 7 diseases may lead to anemia.

5. People should be alert to the presence of malignant tumors if they experience the following conditions:

People with anemia should be especially alert when they have the following symptoms:

1. Dysphagia and swallowing obstruction may be caused by esophageal cancer;

2. Upper abdominal discomfort, nausea, vomiting, etc. may be gastric cancer;

3. Blood in the stool and changes in bowel habits may indicate colon cancer;

4. Nipple discharge and breast lumps may be breast cancer;

5. Long-term chronic dry cough, blood in sputum or hemoptysis may be lung cancer;

6. Abdominal pain, yellowing of the whole body, and itchy skin may be liver cancer or pancreatic cancer;

7. Difficulty urinating and hematuria may indicate kidney cancer, bladder cancer, or prostate cancer.

8. Irregular vaginal bleeding may be caused by uterine cancer or cervical cancer;

9. Fever and many skin bleeding spots may be leukemia, lymphoma, or multiple myeloma.

The presence of these symptoms means that you need to take it seriously. If you don't find the root cause of the anemia and start supplementing iron on your own, you may delay the disease and harm yourself.

However, it should be emphasized that patients with the above symptoms are often in the middle or late stages of the tumor.

6. I have annual physical examinations, but why is cancer always found in the late stage? Can cancer be detected by ordinary physical examinations?

Chief Physician of the Health Management Center: It is difficult to detect early cancer! Because most early cancers have no obvious specific symptoms and can only be detected through targeted examinations. However, many people take physical examinations arranged by their units, which are not cancer prevention physical examinations specifically for cancer. Only when cancer develops to a certain extent can it attract the attention of the patient and the doctor. Cancer is detected through further examinations.

For example, early lung cancer can only be detected through chest CT scans, but most people only have ordinary chest X-rays, which are basically impossible to detect early lung cancer. Early colorectal cancer can only be detected through colonoscopy, but only routine stool tests and tumor indicators may be missed. Esophageal cancer and gastric cancer can only be detected early through gastroscopy. It is difficult to detect early cancer through ordinary B-ultrasound or blood tests.

Therefore, for certain high-risk groups, some special examination items can be added. For example, people who smoke for a long time can have a chest CT scan; patients with a family history of gastrointestinal diseases and chronic enteritis can have a colonoscopy, etc.

Some people found some clues during the physical examination, but did not pay attention to it! Just like Huang Dia in the above story, the physical examination found anemia but did not further confirm the cause, which eventually led to the progression of the disease...