Background: Sickle cell anaemia (SCA) is a chronic haemolytic disorder caused by homozygous inheritance of abnormal haemoglobin called 'haemoglobin S' (HbS). The disease burden is enormous to the patient, family and community. One potential weapon in its prevention is health information and awareness among the populace.
Objective: The study is to detrmine the awareness of sickle cell anaemia among health professionals and medical students at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital Idiaraba, Lagos.
Methods: Part of a large study which was cross-sectional and descriptive study, carried out at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH), between the months of August and September 2006. Data were collected from 403 health professionals and students using structured questionnaires.
Results: Majority (98.7%) of the respondents had heard about SCA. Only 211 (55%) of the respondent felt genotype screening should be done at pre-school age. 128 (33.7%) felt it should be done during childhood. Doctors had a statistically significantly better knowledge of best time for detecting genotype. In all, 85% of the respondents had been involved in the management of sickle cell anaemia with the highest proportion among nurses (p = 0.02). Only 93 (24.3%) of the respondents knew most of the complications of sickle cell anaemia, 176 (46.3%) knew some of it, while 111 (29.2%) knew only a law complications. Nurses had a statistically significantly poorer knowledge of the complication of sickle cell anaemia. More nurses felt that engagement should be ended if there was a risk of having a child with sickle cell anaemia.
Conclusion: Continuing medical education for health professionals about sickle cell anaemia, its management and complication is necessary.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.4314/nqjhm.v19i4.54524 | DOI Listing |
Curr Gene Ther
January 2025
Department of Pharmaceutics, Manipal College of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Manipal 576104, Karnataka, India.
The evolution of genetic exploration tools, from laborious methods like radiationinduced mutations to the transformative CRISPR-Cas9 system, has fundamentally reshaped genetic research and gene editing capabilities. This journey, initiated by foundational techniques such as ZFNs and TALENs and culminating in the groundbreaking work of Doudna and Charpentier in 2012, has ushered in an era of precise DNA alteration and profound insights into gene functions. The CRISPR/Cas9 system uses the Cas9 enzyme and guides RNA (gRNA) to precisely target and cleave DNA, with subsequent repair via error-prone NHEJ or precise HDR, enabling versatile gene editing.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPediatr Blood Cancer
January 2025
Pediatrics Department, Jean Verdier Hospital, APHP, Bondy, France.
Background: Systemic inflammatory diseases (SIDs) have been reported in patients with sickle cell disease (SCD), but clinical data in children are scarce.
Objectives: To identify clinical and laboratory features at diagnosis of SID in children with SCD and to describe their evolution.
Methods: Data from children with SCD and SIDs were retrospectively collected in a French multicenter study from 1991 to 2018.
BMJ Glob Health
January 2025
Sickle Cell Programme, Department of Haematology and Blood Transfusion, Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
Despite progress in healthcare services for individuals living with sickle cell disease (SCD) in Africa, substantial gaps remain in advanced treatments for SCD. To help address this burden, Tanzania has established one of the largest single-centre SCD programmes in the world and developed an advanced therapy programme for SCD focused on patient engagement and advocacy, clinical activities involving exchange blood transfusion (ExBT) and haematopoietic stem cell transplant (HSCT), gene therapy (GT) preparedness, and enabling partnerships. This report describes the programme's genesis, structure and progress achieved.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFComput Biol Med
January 2025
SCOPIA Research Group, University of the Balearic Islands, Dpt. of Mathematics and Computer Science, Crta. Valldemossa, Km 7.5, Palma, E-07122, Spain; Health Research Institute of the Balearic Islands (IdISBa), Palma, E-07122, Spain; Laboratory for Artificial Intelligence Applications at UIB (LAIA@UIB), Palma, E-07122, Spain; Artificial Intelligence Research Institute of the Balearic Islands (IAIB), Palma, E-07122, Spain. Electronic address:
Sickle cell disease causes erythrocytes to become sickle-shaped, affecting their movement in the bloodstream and reducing oxygen delivery. It has a high global prevalence and places a significant burden on healthcare systems, especially in resource-limited regions. Automated classification of sickle cells in blood images is crucial, allowing the specialist to reduce the effort required and avoid errors when quantifying the deformed cells and assessing the severity of a crisis.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBlood
January 2025
New York Blood Center, New York, New York, United States.
Babesiosis in sickle cell disease (SCD) is marked by severe anemia but the underlying red blood cell (RBC) rheological parameters remain largely undefined. Here, we describe altered RBC deformability from both primary (host RBC sickle hemoglobin mediated) and secondary changes (Babesia parasite infection mediated) to the RBC membrane using wild type AA, sickle trait AS and sickle SS RBCs. Our ektacytometry (LORRCA) analysis demonstrates that the changes in the host RBC bio-mechanical properties, pre- and post- Babesia infection, reside on a spectrum of severity, with wild type infected AA cells, despite showing a significant reduction of deformability under both shear and osmolarity gradients, exhibiting only a mild phenotype; compared to infected AS RBCs which show median changes in deformability and infected SS RBCs which exhibit the most dramatic impact of infection on cellular rheology, including an increase in Point of Sickling values.
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