Sickle Cell Anemia Research Paper

Sickle Cell Disease is an illness that affects people all across the globe. This paper will give a description of the sickness through the discussion of the causes, symptoms, and possible cures. Sickle Cell Disease (SCD) is a "group of inherited red blood cell disorders."(1) These disorders can have various afflictions, such as pain, damage and a low blood count--Sickle Cell Anemia.

Sickle cell anemia is a hereditary disorder that mostly affects people of African ancestry, but also occurs in other ethnic groups, including people who are of Mediterranean and Middle Eastern descent. More than 70,000 Americans have sickle cell anemia. And about 2 million Americans - and one in 12 African Americans - have sickle cell trait (this means they carry one gene for the disease, but do not have the disease itself).

Sickle cell anemia can cause numerous symptoms, which the severity of this can vary between individuals. Symptoms that might vary from person to person that change over time, include anemia, episodes of pain, frequent infections, delayed growth, vision disorder, acute chest syndrome, and more. Indeed, of each symptom; anemia, sickle cell breaks red blood cell faster and die living people without enough red blood cells. Sickle cell anemia usually dies in 10 to 20 days while normal live for about 120 days before it replaced. Episodes of pain is a major symptom of this disease and the most common reason for people to get hospitalization; Pain develops when sickle-shaped red blood cells block blood flow through tiny blood vessels to the chest,

Last semester in clinical, there was a patient with sickle cell anemia and he automatically sparked an interest in me. The patient was quite young and was in so much pain that he could not even bear to be touched by the nurse and reported a pain level of 8. Before my encounter with this patient, I did not know much about sickle cell anemia and decided to do some research on this disease. In my research, I learned that a majority of these patients go through acute pain episodes that occur chronically. After learning this and thinking about the young boy in the hospital, I wanted to discover more about how the pain in these patients are managed and controlled.

Complications of sickle cell anemia are pain crisis, infection, acute chest syndrome, splenic sequestration, vision loss, leg ulcers, stroke, deep vein thrombosis and pulmonary embolism. Pain crisis is a feeling of pain that can happen all of the sudden with mild to severe intensity and last for a period of time (“Facts About Sickle Cell Disease,” 2016). Serious bacterial infections are potential life threatening due to the damage to the spleen in some people who have sickle cell anemia (https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/health-topics/topics/sca/signs). Acute chest syndrome can be life threatening and symptoms included chest pain, coughing, difficulty breathing, and fever. Splenic sequestration is can be life threatening

But, with severe pain crisis hospital provides morphine or oxycodone to help prevent the pain. Anemia is a very common complication of Sickle Cell Disease. When anemia occurs a person might have; pale skin, yellow skin, white eyes, slow growth, and delayed puberty. This brief paragraph will let a person know the main part about sickle cell. On how it is treated, the symptoms, and how it is cause. So, now when a person you know that has sickle cell you can let them know you learned a little about sickle cell to help their friend. I still think people with sickle cell disease still can have a regualer life all they have to do is watch what they do every time. Also, they will need to make sure that they are well hydrated at all times. Once you are not hydrated having sickle cell can be the worse thing because of the pain and how bad it comes. Sickle cell diesaes doesn’t ruin one person life it just take that one person know what they can do and cant do at all times. There are doctors that help with sickle cell too. These doctors’ helps you maintain your pain crisis and let you know what you can and cannot do at

This paper will discuss Sickle Cell Anemia. It will describe what the disease is as well as how its contracted. The paper will go on to on to discuss the symtoms risk and statistics of sickle cell aniema. The paper will end with discussing treatment for the disease.

Sickle cell anemia is one of the disease out there in the world that cannot be cured. The only thing people suffering from sickle cell can do is get treatments for the symptoms they are suffering from. Not only are there treatments, but there are also things that can be done that can prevent some of the symptoms. Some of the treatments available are different kinds of medications, vaccines, and experimental treatments. When a child suffers from sickle anemia their life could be put on line when catching an infection that may not be life threating to some who may not have that disease, so it is important for children to take antibiotics. From the antibiotics a person can take painkillers to relieve the suffer pain. A drug that is

In most cases, people with sickle cell begin experiencing symptoms at the age of 4 months’ symptoms include fatigue which happens due to the loss of red blood cells after they rupture as they are extremely fragile. Another symptom will be the pain, it develops when other is a blockage within the blood vessels in your chest, abdomen, and joints. Intensity varies and can even lead to hospitalization. Delayed growth and vision problems of blood cells blocking areas of the body. You are more prone to infections and will also experience swelling of the hands and feet.

Pain can develop when sickle shaped red blood cells block blood flow through tiny vessels to your abdomen and chest. Sickle cell can damage your spleen and since red blood cells provide your body with the oxygen and nutrients you need to grow that will be delayed. Your retina in your eyes can be damaged since tiny blood vessels that supply your eyes gets plugged with sickle cells.

Sickle cell anemia is an inherited disease causing red blood cells to malfunction. It is a disorder the affects hemoglobin the protein found in red blood cells. People with this disease genetically inherit this untypical hemoglobin. This means that it cannot be transmitted from one person to another like the flu virus. These people have what its called hemoglobin (s). What this does is that instead of the red blood cell being circle-shaped it would appear to be a half moon shaped cell. It is necessary for the cells to be round so that they would be able to pass though small and large blood vessels.

While people are trying to find a breakthrough cure for diseases such as Cancer, Sickle Cell patients feel that they are left in the dark of the public’s eye. Each day thousands of people are being faced with the shocking truth of having to live a very hard, tiresome, and very painful life. According to researchers about one in four hundred African American is affected with Sickle Cell. Therefore it is felt that there should be a greater effort in trying to find a cure for this disease.

All of the cells within the tissues of the body need a regular supply of oxygen to function. The hemoglobin found in red blood cells (RBC’s) are essential for the proper transport of oxygen molecules. They bind oxygen in the lungs and carry to every tissue within the body. Due to the structure of hemoglobin, normal RBC’s are donut shaped with a concaved center. This flexible shape is what allows the BRC’s to move freely into very small spaces such as capillaries where they will deliver their oxygen. Sickle cell anemia or other diseases that fall within the broader group of disorders characterized by SCD describe conditions where the protein (hemoglobin) has misfolded and altered the shape of the cell. Sickle hemoglobin allows for the formation of stiff rods within the red blood cell giving it a sickle, or crescent shape. This new shape is not flexible and can block or slow the flow of blood. When this occurs, oxygen cannot reach its intended tissues. This results in severe pain called crises, and these attacks occur

Sickle cell disease is a chronic condition that a person can inherit from their parents in which it effects the globular structure of the patients red blood cells. A more sickle shaped structure, which can alter a person’s blood flow, replaces the more common globular structure. This impairment in blood flow can lead to blood clots, severe debilitating pain and damage to vital organs such as the liver, kidney and spleen. This disease currently affects over 90,000 people in the United States, with the majority of them being African American and

Thousands of years ago, a genetic mutation occurred in people from the Mediterranean basin, India, Africa, and the Middle East. As the Malaria Epidemic attacked people of these countries, carriers of the defective hemoglobin gene survived. Carrying one defective gene means that a person has a sickle cell trait. Two parents with the trait will produce a child with sickle cell anemia. People of these countries migrated and spread to other areas. In the Western Hemisphere, where malaria is not much of a problem, having the abnormal hemoglobin gene has lost its advantage. Any child born from parents that each has the trait will be born with the disease.