Effect of anaemia on cognitive function in children

Study was carried out on 150 school going children to study the relationship between iron deficiency anaemia and cognitive function. Children's were grouped into moderate anaemic, mild anaemic and non-anaemic. Haemoglobin levels were estimated by cyanmethaemoglobin method. Results indicate that 53.33% were mild anaemic, 12% moderate anaemic and 34.67% non-anaemic. Results significantly (p < 0.05) indicates that moderate anaemic children performed poor on attention, design fluency, verbal working memory N-back 2, visual working memory N-back 2, planning, dictation, mathematical calculations, intelligence, immediate verbal learning and visual and verbal memory. Moreover, mild anaemic children performed significantly poor (p < 0.05) in attention, visual working memory N-back 2, dictation, mathematical calculations, intelligence, immediate verbal learning and visual and verbal memory. We concluded that non-anaemic children performed significantly better on cognitive function tests than mild and moderate anaemic. All data are expressed as mean ± SD and were analysed by analysis of variance by using SPSS software.

Keywords: anaemia, anthropometrics, cognitive development, intelligence, nutrition, school children, child development, iron deficiency, haemoglobin levels