Anemia underdiagnosis highlighted by Marbella clinic
- Hospital Quirónsalud Marbella used a May 6 health advisory to warn that persistent fatigue in many patients is actually undiagnosed anemia. - Hematology chief Agustín Hernández said anemia often appears so gradually that patients normalize tiredness, and iron deficiency can cause symptoms even before anemia shows. - That matters because anemia remains common in women and pregnancy, while newer dosing and intravenous iron options make treatment more tailored.
Fatigue is one of those symptoms people brush off for months. But in Marbella, Hospital Quirónsalud Marbella is warning that the “I’m just tired” story often hides something more specific — anemia, or even iron deficiency that has not yet crossed into full anemia. The clinic put that message out on May 6, with hematology chief Agustín Hernández arguing that the real problem is not just treatment. It’s missed detection in the first place. ### Why are they talking about this now? Because the symptom pattern is easy to normalize. The Marbella team’s point is simple — anemia often creeps in slowly, the body adapts, and patients start treating fatigue, shortness of breath, dizziness, pallor, or hair loss as their personal baseline. That is exactly why underdiagnosis happens. It does not always look dramatic. ### What is anemia, exactly? Anemia means the blood has too little hemoglobin or too few healthy red blood cells to carry oxygen well enough to the body’s tissues. That oxygen gap is why people feel wiped out, weak, foggy, or breathless with ordinary effort. The Marbella clinic framed it in those practical terms, which is useful because patients usually feel the oxygen problem before they know the lab word for it. ### Why does it get missed so easily? Because “fatigue” is vague. It overlaps with stress, poor sleep, depression, menopause, overwork, infections, and a long list of chronic illnesses. Mayo Clinic notes that another disease can mask anemia symptoms, and Quirónsalud Marbella makes the same point from the clinic side — if nobody stops to ask why the tiredness is there, the answer can slide by. ### Is this only about low hemoglobin? No — and that is one of the more interesting parts of the Marbella message. Hernández says patients can have iron deficiency without formal anemia and still feel fatigue or trouble concentrating. That lines up with newer reviews arguing that iron deficiency exists on a spectrum, and symptoms can start before hemoglobin drops below the anemia cutoff. Basically, the lab threshold is not the whole story. ### Who gets hit most often? Women of reproductive age and pregnant patients are the big groups the Marbella team highlighted. That fits the broader picture too. WHO still treats anemia as a major public-health problem, and it estimates that
