Relationship between depressive symptoms and anemia among the middle-aged and elderly: a cohort study over 4-year period

BACKGROUND: The association between anemia and depression has been demonstrated in previous studies, but it's still unclear whether depressive symptoms as a hazard factor for anemia. The findings of a large-scale cross-sectional and longitudinal examination of such an association of among the middle-aged and elderly individuals in China were presented in our study. METHODS: The data from China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study in 2011 and 2015 were evaluated. 10,179 and 5,887 participants were included in cross-sectional and longitudinal study, respectively. According to the World Health Organization, hemoglobin concentrations below 13 g/dL for males and 12 g/dL for females are considered anemia. The research population was separated into two groups based on scores of the 10-item short form of the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D-10): the group with depressed symptoms had a score of more than 10 points, and the group with depressive disorder had a score of more than 20 points. Multilevel logistic regression analyses were conducted to explore the relationship between anemia and varying degrees of depressive symptoms, utilizing three models based on adjusting for different types of covariates. RESULTS: In our cross-sectional investigation, depression disorders were more likely to link to the occurrence of anemia (OR, 1.34; 95% CI, 1.02–1.77; P = 0.035). Additionally, there seems a linear connection between depression questionnaire scores and hemoglobin concentrations (r = - 0.053, P < 0.001). Depressive symptom was significantly associated with anemia over 4 years of follow-up, and the more intense the depressive symptoms, the greater the danger of anemia (depressive symptoms group: OR, 1.27; 95% CI, 1.02–1.57, P = 0.032; depressive disorder group: OR, 1.59; 95% CI, 1.12–2.25, P = 0.010). CONCLUSIONS: Our findings suggest that depression symptoms seem related to anemia in the middle-aged and elderly in China cross-sectionally and longitudinally, and that the risk of anemia increases with the severity of depressive symptoms. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12888-023-05047-6.