A Point-of-Care Method with Integrated Decision Support Tool to Estimate Anemia at Population Level.

Abstract

Robust point-of-care methods are required to estimate anemia at the population level. The accurate methods are lab-based and cannot be used at the point of care. To address this caveat, a novel method based on pooled capillary blood and a portable autoanalyzer was developed for the estimation of Hb. Additionally, custom software was developed for near-real-time integration of the Hb values from the auto analyzer to the server. Moreover, a decision support tool that can immediately categorize the participants into different stages of anemia was developed. The decision support tool was designed based on the World Health Organization (WHO) cut-off for anemia at the population level and was available for all age and gender groups. This simple and user-friendly tool couldeasily be used by front-line health workers who have limited technical skills. Overall, the method developed couldbe used at the point of care and is accurate. This high-throughput method couldbe used for screening anemia at the population level for all age and gender groups.