• James C Barton, Corwin Q Edwards, and Ronald T Acton.
• Southern Iron Disorders Center, Birmingham, AL, USA; Department of Medicine, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, USA. Electronic address: bartonjames336@gmail.com.
• Am. J. Med. Sci. 2023 Jan 1; 365 (1): 313631-36.

BackgroundLittle is known about the prevalence of HFE (homeostatic iron regulator) hemochromatosis in African Americans (AA).MethodsWe defined AA as self-identified AA, blacks, or non-Hispanic blacks. We defined hemochromatosis-associated HFE genotypes as p.C282Y/p.C282Y and p.C282Y/p.H63D. We compiled prevalences of these genotypes in AA using published population and cohort data and numbers of men and women ≥18 y‬ in 2018 U.S. Census estimates. We defined iron overload (IO) and IO-related disease by genotype as previously reported in population and cohort studies of hemochromatosis in whites of European ancestry. We used these definitions to estimate prevalences and numbers of AA with IO and IO-related disease associated with hemochromatosis-associated HFE genotypes.ResultsThere were ∼16,287,599 men and ∼17,644,898 women. HFE genotypes and their respective prevalences were: p.C282Y/p.C282Y, 0.00017 (6/34,905) [95% confidence interval 0.000034, 0.00031] and p.C282Y/p.H63D, 0.0012 (41/33,596) [0.000084, 0.0016]. IO prevalences were: men 0.000076 [0.000072, 0.000081] and women 0.0000061 [0.0000050, 0.0000073]. IO-related disease prevalences were: men 0.000063 [0.000059, 0.000067] and women 0.0000021 [0.0000014, 0.0000027]. There were ∼1021 [961, 1091] men and ∼36 [25, 48] women with IO-related disease.ConclusionsWe conclude that ∼1/25,061 AA >18 y have a hemochromatosis-associated HFE genotype and IO and that ∼1/32,103 AA >18 y have a hemochromatosis-associated HFE genotype and IO-related disease.Copyright © 2022 Southern Society for Clinical Investigation. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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