This case-control study compared albumin, copper, manganese and cobalt in children with sickle cell anemia in steady state and matched children with normal hemoglobin in a rural, low-resource area of southeastern DR Congo. The authors report no significant differences for any of the four measures. For manganese, the reported group means differ fourfold but the comparison did not reach significance.
Key numbers
- Manganese, mean ± SD: 0.12 ± 0.04 µg/L in children with sickle cell anemia (n = 76) versus 0.03 ± 0.01 µg/L in controls (n = 76); p = 0.057 (Results, p. 2).
- Mean age 10.0 years (SD 5.4) in the sickle cell group and 9.2 years (SD 4.7) in controls (Results, p. 2).
Methods (brief)
Venous blood was drawn into EDTA tubes and manganese, copper and cobalt were measured by atomic absorption spectrophotometry at a mineralogy laboratory in Kasumbalesa. Children under iron therapy or chronic transfusion were excluded. Groups were compared with Student’s t-test.
Evidence fitness
The paper reports manganese values in a vulnerable pediatric group in a mining region, but with weak methods reporting. It does not support conclusions about exposure sources, toxicity or normal ranges.
Limitations
The abstract describes plasma while the methods describe blood samples, and no detection limit, calibration or reference material results are reported. The reported values are very low for blood manganese and are hard to compare with other studies. The authors describe the manganese means as similar despite a fourfold difference and p = 0.057.
Related evidence
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