Anemia, hematinic deficiencies, hyperhomocysteinemia, and gastric parietal cell antibody positivity in oral lichen planus patients with normocytosis.

Background/purpose: Normocytosis is defined as having the mean corpuscular volume (MCV) between 80 fL and 99.9 fL. This study evaluated whether the 474 oral lichen planus (OLP) patients with normocytosis (so-called normocytosis/OLP patients) had significantly higher frequencies of anemia, hematinic deficiencies, hyperhomocysteinemia, and serum gastric parietal cell antibody (GPCA) positivity than 588 healthy control subjects or 588 OLP patients. Materials and methods: Complete blood count, serum iron, vitamin B12, folic acid, homocysteine, and GPCA levels in 588 OLP patients, 474 normocytosis/OLP patients, and 588 healthy control subjects were measured and compared. Results: We found that 14.3 %, 12.7 %, 4.0 %, 1.5 %, 16.0 %, and 19.8 % of the 474 normocytosis/OLP patients had blood hemoglobin (Hb) and serum iron, vitamin B12, and folic acid deficiencies, hyperhomocysteinemia, and serum GPCA positivity, respectively. Furthermore, the 474 normocytosis/OLP patients had significantly higher frequencies of blood Hb and serum iron, vitamin B12, and folic acid deficiencies, hyperhomocysteinemia, and serum GPCA positivity than 588 healthy control subjects (all P-values <0.05). On the contrary, the 474 normocytosis/OLP patients had significantly lower frequencies of blood Hb and serum vitamin B12 deficiencies and hyperhomocysteinemia than the overall 588 OLP patients (all P-values <0.05). Conclusion: We conclude that there are significantly higher frequencies of anemia, serum iron, vitamin B12, and folic acid deficiencies, hyperhomocysteinemia, and serum GPCA positivity in normocytosis/OLP patients than in healthy control subjects. On the contrary, normocytosis/OLP patients do have significantly lower frequencies of blood Hb and vitamin B12 deficiencies and hyperhomocysteinemia than overall OLP patients.