How hormones acting on their receptors influence mature erythrocytes

Anemia is the most common disorder globally and one of the conditions that general practitioners most frequently encounter. Human erythrocytes, also known as red blood cells, or RBC, are exposed to constant stress while they circulate in the blood (e.g. shear stress, osmotic stress, oxidative stress). The scope of this review was to analyze the literature data on what the hormonal receptors do on mature erythrocytes and how they relate to the risk of anemia. We investigated the literature data in the most recent five-year period (PubMed, Google Schoolar) and analyzed the effects of hormonal receptors on four specific characteristics of mature erythrocytes: osmotic resistance, deformability/rheology, erythrocyte hemoglobin affinity to oxygen and eryptosis. We found that the hormones have a strong impact in regulating erythrocyte survival and functionality. These receptors increase the physiological plasticity of mature erythrocytes and serve as the effective tool for deeper effects of integral regulatory mechanisms that promote their survival and whole-body homeostasis. Additionally, these hormonal receptors are closely associated with the risk of anemia: when the supportive function of hormones and their receptors is not effective, eryptosis increases and, consequently, the number of mature erythrocytes in the circulation decreases.