Anemia is defined as a reduction of hemoglobin (Hb) levels of <13 g/dL for a man and <12 g/dL for a woman. It is very frequent among hospitalized patients and can be a serious problem in patients who undergo cervical spine surgery. Anemia can be classified as:
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Mild (Hb: >10 g/dL)
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Moderate (Hb: 8–10 g/dL)
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Severe (Hb: 6–8 g/dL)
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Very severe (Hb: <6 g/dL)
To identify the causes of anemia, we can use functional and morphologic criteria. However, from a practical point of view, the morphologic criteria are preferred and require the reticulocytes absolute number and the mean corpuscular volume (MCV), respectively. The flowchart for identifying the causes of anemia using morphologic criteria is reported in Fig. 2.1.
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Avvisati, G. et al. (2010). Hematologic Issues in Cervical Spine Surgery. In: Denaro, L., D'Avella, D., Denaro, V. (eds) Pitfalls in Cervical Spine Surgery. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-85019-9_2
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