Objective To understand the correlation between blood lead, blood routine and reticulocyte parameters in patients with occupational chronic lead poisoning, so as to provide scientific basis for the auxiliary diagnosis of lead poisoning and the evaluation of curative effect in treatment of occupational chronic lead poisoning.

Methods Totally 117 patients with occupational lead exposure, including chronic lead poisoning patients and in-hospital lead excretion patients, were selected as the study group, and 105 healthy workers as the physical examination group. The blood routine and reticulocyte parameters were measured by the full-automatic blood cell analyzer. The correlation between blood lead level and parameters of blood routine examination was analyzed.

Results The number of reticulocyte (RET) of cases with lead poisoning was significantly higher than that of healthy workers, the normal lead exposure workers and the worker diagnosed as lead absorption (P < 0.05). The number of low fluorescent reticulocyte (LFR) of the workers of study group was higher than that of healthy workers (P < 0.05), while MFR (middle fluorescent reticulocyte), IRF (immature reticulocyte index) and RMI (reticulocyte maturity index) were lower (P < 0.05). The number of high fluorescent reticulocyte (HFR) of cases with lead poisoning was higher than that of heathy workers, while lower than that of the normal lead exposure workers and the workers diagnosed as lead absorption (P < 0.05). Blood lead level was positively correlated with RET (r=0.477, P < 0.01), negatively correlated with hemoglobin (r=-0.203, P < 0.05), negatively correlated with WBC count (r=-0.203, P < 0.05), and negatively correlated with platelet count (r=-0.192, P < 0.05).

Conclusion Occupational chronic lead poisoning had a significant effect on the blood routine and reticulocyte parameters. Reticulocyte related parameters can be used as an early auxiliary diagnostic indicator for lead poisoning patients.