Anaemia: intrinsic factor antibodies diagnosed pernicious anaemia.

Clinical bottom line (level 4)

The presence of autoantibodies to intrinsic factor diagnosed pernicious anaemia.

Rothenberg et al: Journal of Laboratory Clinical Medicine 1971; 77 (3): 476-484

Expires June 2003

The study

Setting: university hospital, USA

37 patients (aged ?, ?% male) 23 patients with pernicious anaemia and 14 with folate-deficient megaloblastic anaemia

Independent ?blinded reference standard, applied in some patients from a consecutive inappropriate spectrum.
Reference standard:

megaloblastic anaemia, low serum B12, deficiency of gastric intrinsic factor (on direct assay of gastric juices or absorption studies), and a therapeutic response to B12

Diagnostic test: autoantibodies to intrinsic factor- positive if inhibition >27%

The evidence

diagnostic test	pernicious anaemia	folate-deficient anaemia	LR+ (95% CI)	post-test probability	LR- (95% CI)	post-test probability
antibodies	17	0	inf (3.8 to inf)	100%	0.26 (0.13 to 0.52)	30%
total	23	14

Comments

The lack of information about the patients studied or the reference standard used makes these results much less certain.

Citation

Rothenberg SP, Kantha KRK, Ficarra A: Autoantibodies to intrinsic factor: their definition and clinical usefulness. Journal of Laboratory Clinical Medicine 1971; 77 (3): 476-484

Search Terms: reference from review article
Contributor: Chris Ball and Clare Wotton, June 2000
Reviewer:

_{Clinical Question.}

_Patient	_{pernicious anaemia or folate-deficient megaloblastic anaemia}
_{Intervention or Exposure}	_{autoantibodies to intrinsic factor}
_Outcome	_{diagnosis of pernicious anaemia}