Jaundice and urine color

[ASM student]

In hemolytic anemia urine urobilinogen is increased which would mean that the amount coverted to urobilin would increase as well and urine color would at least change in intensity, so how it would be normal as if nothing changed knowing that urobilin is the pigment that gives the urine it's color?

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[iBS1972]

You're right, theoretically the urine color should also be dark as a result of the increased urobilin. Sometimes the hemolytic anemia is not severe enough to cause such a noticeable change. Othertimes, you might also have other diseases that prevent the concentration of urine causing impaired resorption of water from the tubules, so that the concentration of urobilin becomes dilute from the excess filtrate in the nephron tubules. Either way, the increase in urobilin concentration is too small to be noticeable by gross observation alone.