Font Size: 

BACKGROUND: Anemia is an abnormal hemoglobin concentration in blood that impact almost 40% school age children in developing countries. Intestinal parasitic infections, along with malnutrition are contributed to influence absorption, transport, and metabolism of iron which is the most common etiology of anemia in school age children. AIM: The purpose of this study was to determine whether there’s correlation between iron deficiency anemia (IDA) and intestinal parasitic infection generally and protozoa infection particularly among school age children in Medan. MATERIAL AND METHODS: This study was analytical cross sectional study conducted on May until October 2016 in primary school in Medan and Hamparan Perak, Deliserdang. Consecutive sampling was used with total 132 samples obtained. Univariate analysis was performed to see general characteristic and prevalence of IDA, intestinal parasitic infections, and protoza infections. Bivariate analysis was performed to determine whether there is correlation between IDA and intestinal parasitic infections and IDA with protozoa infections using Chi Square (χ2) test. Anova used to determine if there are mean differences among iron deficiency anemia’s variables according to intestinal parasitic infection and protozoa infections. RESULTS: This study showed prevalence of iron deficiency anemia (IDA) was 7.6% and prevalence of intestinal parasitic infection was 25.8% with 19.8% protozoa infection. The correlation between IDA and intestinal parasitic infection was not significant in statistical analysis using Chi Square Test (p value: 0.235), neither was between IDA and protozoa infection (p value: 0.287). When all IDA variables such as serum iron, ferritin, TIBC, MCH, and MCHC was correlated to intestinal parasitic infection and protozoa infection, we could not find any significant correlation neither in chi square test nor in Anova test (p value > 0.05). CONCLUSION: It is recommended that every primary school pays more attention in sanitation, hygiene, and healthy behavior in their students to decrease risk of intestinal parasitic infections.