African Americans at Risk for Increased Iron Stores or Liver Disease

To link to full-text access for this article, visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.amjmed.2006.05.049 Byline: Fitzroy W. Dawkins (a), Victor R. Gordeuk (a), Beverly M. Snively (b), Laura Lovato (b), James C. Barton (c), Ronald T. Acton (d), Gordon D. McLaren (e), Catherine Leiendecker-Foster (f), Christine E. McLaren (g), Paul C. Adams (h), Mark Speechley (h), Emily L. Harris (i), Sharon Jackson (b), Elizabeth J. Thomson (j) Keywords: African Americans; Serum ferritin; Transferrin saturation; HFE; Liver disease; Increased iron stores Abstract: We sought to determine the prevalence of elevated measures of iron status in African Americans and whether the combination of serum ferritin concentration >200 [mu]g/L for women or >300 [mu]g/L for men and transferrin saturation in the highest quartile represents increased likelihood of mutation of HFE, self-reported iron overload or self-reported liver disease. Author Affiliation: (a) Division of Hematology/Oncology, Department of Medicine, Howard University, Washington, DC (b) Department of Public Health Sciences, Wake Forest University School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, NC (c) Southern Iron Disorders Center, Birmingham, Ala (d) Departments of Microbiology, Medicine, and Epidemiology and International Health, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, Ala (e) Division of Hematology/Oncology, Department of Medicine, University of California, Irvine and Veterans Affairs Long Beach Healthcare System, Long Beach (f) Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis (g) Epidemiology Division, Department of Medicine, University of California, Irvine (h) Department of Medicine, London Health Sciences Center, London, Ontario, Canada (i) Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Research, Portland, Ore (j) National Human Genome Research Institute, Bethesda, Md. Article Note: (footnote) The HEIRS Study was initiated and funded by NHLBI, in conjunction with NHGRI. The study is supported by contracts N01-HC-05185 (University of Minnesota), N01-HC-05186 (Howard University), N01-HC-05188 (University of Alabama at Birmingham), N01-HC-05189 (Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Research), N01-HC-05190 (University of California, Irvine), N01-HC-05191 (London Health Sciences Centre), and N01-HC-05192 (Wake Forest University). Additional support was provided by grant UH1-HL03679-07 from NHLBI and the Office of Minority Health, and by General Clinical Research Center (GCRC) grants to Howard University (M01-RR10284), University of California, Irvine (5M01RR 00827-29) and University of Alabama at Birmingham (M01-RR00032), sponsored by the National Center for Research Resources, National Institutes of Health (NCRR/NIH).