What is it about?
Back in the last two or three decades most of the sickle cell disease die before their fifth birthday. However, with relative improvement in the care of people living with sickle cell disease, their survival outcome and average life expectancy have improved. Today, SCD can live beyond the age of marriage in our region, although associated with several complications. This was an epidemiological study of sickle cell disease pregnant women booked in ante-natal clinic in a tertiary hospital in Southern Nigeria.
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Why is it important?
This study is important because Nigeria bears the highest burden of sickle cell disease in the whole wide world, and SCD is associated with obstetric complications, especially in unsupervised pregnancies. This study was a socio-demographic overview of SCD among the pregnant population in Southern Nigeria, the pattern of booking (based on trimester) and the hematological indices (i.e., grades of anemia) at booking. This study could be useful in budget planning and in risk stratification (i.e., prognostication of the categories of SCD pregnant women prone to obstetric complications).
Perspectives
The prevalence of sickle cell disease in pregnancy is gradually increasing in the region, although this group of the population is confronted with obstetric complications. Their conditions are worsened in this part of the world because of late antenatal bookings, poor education, moderate to severe anemia and poor access to health care. By summing up these risk factors, we can deduce that the prognosis of sickle cell disease in pregnancy in southern Nigeria is bad as many of them usually end up with either maternal and/or fetal deaths. There is a need to scale up the comprehensive care of sickle cell disease in pregnancy population in Nigeria. This intervention could be a strategy in SCD prevention.
Dr Ogbonna Collins Nwabuko
Federal Medical Center, Umuahia.
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Prevalence of sickle cell disease among pregnant women in a tertiary health center in south-south Nigeria, Sub-Saharan African Journal of Medicine, January 2016, Medknow,
DOI: 10.4103/2384-5147.190843.
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