Cutting stroke risk in sickle cell cases

Some patients with severe sickle cell disease may need a lifetime of blood transfusions to reduce the chances of suffering a stroke. Scientists had hoped that patients with the blood disease could be treated with a limited number of transfusions. But a new study of 100 children, published in the Dec. 29 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, found that the stroke risk reappeared after blood exchanges were stopped.

Sickle cell disease is a genetic disorder that causes normally flexible red blood cells to contort into a crescent-moon shape that makes them clump, blocking blood vessels and causing most patients bouts of intense pain.

About 1 in 650 African Americans and up to 1 in 1,000 Latinos in the United States have some form of sickle cell disease.

Roughly 10% of those patients, who have narrowed blood vessels in the brain, face a higher-than-average chance of stroke. Those patients with the higher risk have a 1 in 10 chance of having a stroke in a given year. Regular transfusions of red blood cells typically cut the stroke risk by 90%.