Risk Factors for Anemia in Patients with Chronic Renal Failure: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Anemia in patients with chronic kidney disease presents significant impacts on patients, the health-care system and financial resources. There is a significant variation in the primary studies on risk factors of anemia in this patient population across the globe. Therefore, this study aimed to identify the risk factors of anemia among chronic kidney disease patients at the global level.

PubMed, Scopus, African Journals Online, Web of Science and Google Scholar were searched and complemented by manual searches. A Funnel plot and Egger's regression test were used to determine publication bias. DerSimonian and Laird random-effects modes were applied to estimate pooled effect sizes, odds ratios, and 95% confidence interval across studies. Analysis was performed using STATA™ Version 14 software.

A total of 28 studies with 24,008 study participants were included in this study. Female sex (AOR= 1.36; 95% CI 1.11, 1.67), stage 5 CKD (AOR = 13.66; 95% CI: 5.19, 35.92), body mass index ≥ 30 kg/m² (AOR = 0.51; 95% CI: 0.29, 0.91), comorbidities (AOR = 2.90; 95% CI: 1.68, 5.0), proteinuria 3⁺(AOR = 3.57; 95% CI: 1.03, 12.93), hypocalcemia (AOR=3.61, 95%CI: 1.56-8.36), and iron therapy (AOR: 0.59; 95% CI:0.31, 0.98) were significantly associated with anemia of chronic kidney disease.

Female sex, stage 5 CKD, body mass index ≥ 30 kg/m², comorbidity, and hypocalcemia were found to be significantly associated with anemia of chronic kidney disease. Therefore, situation-based interventions and country context-specific preventive strategies should be developed to reduce the risk factors of anemia in patients with chronic renal failure.