Looking Backwards to the Future: The WHO Haemoglobin Colour Scale

The Haemoglobin Colour Scale was developed for WHO as a simple, cheap, pocket-sized device for providing a reading of haemoglobin within 1 g/dL of true value. It is intended for the clinician/health worker without easy access to a laboratory, and it thus has an important role in management of anaemia in peripheral health services, especially in under-resourced areas, as well as in antenatal and child health programmes, in screening blood donors and for point-of-care anaemia checks anywhere. An international validation trial and other studies have confirmed its reliabilty when tested against reference haemoglobinometry. It is much more reliable than clinical examination in assessing the severity of anaemia and it has advantages over copper sulphate in blood donor screening.