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What Does This Blood Report Indicate?
Question: I had a blood test recently that showed my Hemoglobin at 12.4 and MCH 24.4 with my MCHC at 30.8 the only other count out of scale is the Glucose serum at 153 – should I be concerned?
I am 79 and weigh 163
YYYY@YYYY
I am 79 and weigh 163
YYYY@YYYY
Brief Answer:
it depends...
Detailed Answer:
Hello,
your hemoglobin is lower than normal for men but it depends on your previous values. Some individuals have lower hematocrits (and hemoglobins). If you used to have higher values then the cause of anemia has to be investigated. Since you're taking iron supplementation, I guess that iron deficiency has been diagnosed. In such cases the cause of iron deficiency is of interest. The causes may include dietary restriction of iron (no meat in diet), malabsorption, iron loss due to bleeding (hemorrhoids, colon tumor, etc), etc. So whenever a doctor finds iron deficiency, the investigation should reveal the underlying disorder that caused it. MCH and MCHC are not very useful. The low MCH usually means iron deficiency.
Finally the blood glucose was too high if it was fasting glucose. I would suggest doing an oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT) and glucosylated hemoglobin measurements to diagnose diabetes (or exclude it).
I hope it helps!
Kind Regards!
it depends...
Detailed Answer:
Hello,
your hemoglobin is lower than normal for men but it depends on your previous values. Some individuals have lower hematocrits (and hemoglobins). If you used to have higher values then the cause of anemia has to be investigated. Since you're taking iron supplementation, I guess that iron deficiency has been diagnosed. In such cases the cause of iron deficiency is of interest. The causes may include dietary restriction of iron (no meat in diet), malabsorption, iron loss due to bleeding (hemorrhoids, colon tumor, etc), etc. So whenever a doctor finds iron deficiency, the investigation should reveal the underlying disorder that caused it. MCH and MCHC are not very useful. The low MCH usually means iron deficiency.
Finally the blood glucose was too high if it was fasting glucose. I would suggest doing an oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT) and glucosylated hemoglobin measurements to diagnose diabetes (or exclude it).
I hope it helps!
Kind Regards!
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Above answer was peer-reviewed by :
Dr. Chakravarthy Mazumdar
Answered by
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