Beschreibung:
The American Academy of Pediatrics currently recommends that children should be screened for anemia during infancy, in early childhood, in late childhood, and again some time during adolescence. In this issue of Pediatrics, Young and co-workers1 report their comparison of two different commonly used tests to screen for anemia. Specifically, they compared the sensitivity of the microhematocrit using capillary blood v electronically determined cell counts (ie, Coulter count) using venous blood. The authors conclude that the capillary blood microhematocrit test is an acceptable office screening test for anemia and very few children with low venous hemoglobin concentrations escape detection using this procedure.