The relationship between FGF23 and anemia in HD and renal transplant patients

Recent studies claim that FGF23 is also associated with anemia and inflammation. In this study, the relationship between FGF23 and anemia in hemodialysis (HD) and renal transplantation patients (RTx patients) patients was investigated. This was a cross-sectional study involving 40 RTx patients (13 females, 27 males; mean age, 45.93 ± 12.49 years) who had transplantation at least 6 months before, 25 HD patients (12 females, 13 males; mean age, 54.72 ± 15.5 years), and 20 healthy control subjects (13 females, 7 males; mean age, 36.7 ± 9.38 years). FGF23 was studied using Elisa method. Parameters such as iron, ferritin, total iron binding capacity, and transferrin saturation were assessed. FGF23 level was significantly higher in HD patients when compared with the RTx patients and control groups. In the bivariate correlation analysis, hemoglobin was positively correlated with albumin (r = 0.681, p = 0.000), ferritin (r = 0.446, p = 0.043), and negatively correlated with CRP (r = − 0.476, p = 0.016) and FGF23 (r = 0.493, p = 0.043). FGF23 was found to be an independent predictor of decreased hemoglobin in HD patients. In addition, this association was observed to disappear after transplantation. While FGF23 is closely related to hemoglobin levels in HD patients, we have shown that this relationship disappears after transplantation.