Anemia

Anemia happens when your blood doesn't have enough hemoglobin (he-mo-GLOBE-in). Hemoglobin helps red blood cells carry oxygen from your lungs to all parts of your body.

There are many types of anemia, all with different causes:

• Iron deficiency anemia (IDA). IDA is the most common type of anemia. IDA happens when you don't have enough iron in your body. You need iron to make hemoglobin. This can happen when you lose blood from problems like heavy periods, ulcers, colon polyps, or colon cancer. A diet that doesn't have enough iron in it can also cause IDA. Pregnancy can also cause IDA if there's not enough iron for the mother and fetus. You can get iron from foods like ground beef, clams, spinach, lentils, baked potato with skin, sunflower seeds, and cashews.

• Megaloblastic (or vitamin deficiency) anemia. This most often happens when your body doesn't get enough folic acid or vitamin B-12. These vitamins help your body keep healthy blood and a healthy nervous system. With this type of anemia, your body makes red blood cells that can't deliver oxygen right. Folic acid supplements (pills) can treat this type of anemia. You can also get folic acid in beans and legumes; citrus fruits and juices; wheat bran and other whole grains; dark green leafy vegetables; and poultry, pork, shellfish, and liver. Sometimes, with this disease, your health care provider may not realize you're not getting enough B-12. This usually happens to someone with pernicious anemia, a type of autoimmune disease. B-12 deficiency may also be more common in people with other autoimmune diseases, like Crohn's disease. Not getting enough B-12 can cause numbness in your legs and feet, problems walking, memory loss, and problems seeing. The treatment depends on the cause. But you may need to get B-12 shots or take special B-12 pills.

• Underlying diseases. Certain diseases can hurt the body's ability to make red blood cells. For example, people with kidney disease, especially those getting dialysis (takes out wastes from your blood if your kidneys can't), are at higher risk for developing anemia. Their kidneys can't create enough hormones to make blood cells, and iron is lost in dialysis.

• Inherited blood disease. If you have a blood disease in your family, there is a higher risk that you will also have this disease. One type of inherited blood disease is sickle cell anemia. Instead of having normal red blood cells that move through blood vessels easily, sickle cells are hard and have a curved edge. These cells cannot squeeze through small blood vessels and block the organs from getting blood. Your body destroys sickle red cells quickly, but it can't make new red blood cells fast enough. This causes anemia. Another inherited blood disease is thalassemia. It happens when the body is missing certain genes or when variant (different from normal) genes are passed down from parents that affect how the body makes hemoglobin.

• Aplastic anemia. This rare problem happens when your body doesn't make enough red blood cells. Since this affects the white blood cells too, there is a higher risk for infections and bleeding that can't be stopped. This can be caused by many things:

• cancer treatments (radiation or chemotherapy)
• exposure to toxic chemicals (like those used in some insecticides, paint, and household cleaners)
• some drugs (like those that treat rheumatoid arthritis)
• autoimmune diseases (like lupus)
• viral infection that affects bone marrow o bone marrow diseases

The treatment depends on how serious the anemia is. It can be treated with blood transfusions, medicines, or a bone marrow transplant.