ArticleEuropean journal of clinical microbiology & infectious diseases : official publication of the European Society of Clinical Microbiology2013
Iron deficiency and susceptibility to infections: evaluation of the clinical evidence.
Article in European journal of clinical microbiology & infectious diseases : official publication of the European Society of Clinical Microbiology, 2013. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 25 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
25 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 47 citations in OpenAlex.
- Prevalence of childhood anaemia in Brazil: still a serious health problem: a systematic review and meta-analysis.Public health nutrition · 2021Pooled it
- Iron Deficiency and Incident Infections among Community-Dwelling Adults Age 70 Years and Older: Results from the DO-HEALTH Study.The journal of nutrition, health & aging · 2022Trial
- Article
- The associations among iron metabolism markers, iron supplementation regimen, and sepsis-induced myocardial injury: a retrospective study.Frontiers in nutrition · 2026Article
- Iron status at early pregnancy is associated with infectious respiratory and gastric illness in women receiving routine iron supplementation: the NuPED prospective cohort.BMC pregnancy and childbirth · 2025Article
- Iron deficiency and infection risk in Danish blood donors.Transfusion · 2025Article
- Association between urinary tract infections and anemia among the elderly in India: Insights from the longitudinal aging study.PLOS global public health · 2025Article
- Iron deficiency in children with a focus on inflammatory conditions.Clinical and experimental pediatrics · 2024Article
- The IRONy in Athletic Performance.Nutrients · 2023Review
- Iron Deficiency Anemia in Infancy, Childhood, and Adolescence.Turkish archives of pediatrics · 2023Article
- The Association between Iron-Deficiency Anemia (IDA) and Septic Arthritis (SA): The Real-World Data.Medicina (Kaunas, Lithuania) · 2022Article
- Article
- Malnutrition and Dietary Habits Alter the Immune System Which May Consequently Influence SARS-CoV-2 Virulence: A Review.International journal of molecular sciences · 2022Review
- Serial T-SPOT.TB responses in Tanzanian adolescents: Transient, persistent and irregular conversions.PloS one · 2022Article
- Risk and Adverse Outcome Factors of Severe Acute Malnutrition in Children: A Hospital-Based Study in Odisha.Cureus · 2021Article
- Nutritional status, diet and viral respiratory infections: perspectives for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2.The British journal of nutrition · 2021Review
- Iron metabolism imbalance at the time of listing increases overall and infectious mortality after liver transplantation.World journal of gastroenterology · 2020Article
- Diagnosis and management of iron deficiency in children with or without anemia: consensus recommendations of the SPOG Pediatric Hematology Working Group.European journal of pediatrics · 2020Review
- The Role of Iron and Siderophores in Infection, and the Development of Siderophore Antibiotics.Clinical infectious diseases : an official publication of the Infectious Diseases Society of America · 2019Article
- Association of iron deficiency anemia with tuberculosis in Taiwan: A nationwide population-based study.PloS one · 2019Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Iron is a fundamental nutrient for human and microbial life. We sought to examine the association of iron deficiency versus normal iron status with the susceptibility to infections. A systematic search in the PubMed and Scopus databases was performed to identify relevant clinical studies. Six studies (including a total of 1,422 participants) met the inclusion criteria: four prospective cohort (859 participants), one retrospective case-control (115 participants), and one retrospective cohort study (448 participants). Intensive care unit (ICU)-acquired and postoperative infections were more common in patients with iron deficiency than among those with normal iron status in two studies, while no difference was reported in another study. In one study examining pregnant women with normal mean iron values, higher soluble transferrin receptor values independently predicted vaginosis-like microflora. Iron deficiency anemia was an independent predictor of respiratory tract infections in one study, and postoperative urinary tract infections were more common in patients with iron deficiency anemia in another. The limited available evidence suggests that individuals with iron deficiency and those with iron deficiency anemia may be more susceptible to infections than patients with normal iron status. Future studies should elucidate further these findings.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.