15/09/2021
What is Thalassemia, its Causes, Symptoms, Diagnosis/Treatment with my 9 years of experience.
Hello! Everybody I am Hamza Sajjad and today I am going to guide you about Thalassemia, its Causes, Symptoms, Diagnosis/Treatment with my 9 years of experience.
Causes:
This disease is transferred by generation to generation. Thalassemia is an inherited condition. The genes received from one's parents before birth determine whether a person will have thalassemia. Thalassemia cannot be caught or passed on to another person. The clinical severity of thalassemia varies tremendously depending on the exact nature of the genes that a person inherits.
There are four types of Thalassemia and they are Thalassemia Major, Minor, Career and Intermediate. In this article I will tell you about Thalassemia Major.
Thalassemia is an inherited blood disorder that causes your body to have less hemoglobin than normal. Hemoglobin enables red blood cells to carry oxygen. Thalassemia can cause anemia, leaving you fatigued. So before Marriage peoples should consult their Hemoglobin Electrophoresis test.
If you have mild thalassemia, you might not need treatment. But more severe forms might require regular blood transfusions. You can take these steps to cope with fatigue, such as choosing a healthy diet and exercising regularly.
Symptoms:
There are several types of thalassemia. The signs and symptoms you have depend on the type and severity of your condition.
The common and most found symptoms in Thalassemia patients are:
1. Fatigue
2. Weakness
3. Pale or yellowish skin
4. Facial bone deformities
5. Slow growth
6. Abdominal swelling
7. Dark urine
8. Sometimes the Face is also swollen
9. Diarrhea
10. Vomiting
Some babies show signs and symptoms of thalassemia at birth but others develop them during the first two or three years of life. Some people who have only one affected hemoglobin gene they don't have thalassemia symptoms. You should visit a doctor and make an appointment with your child's doctor for an evaluation if he/she has any signs or symptoms of Thalassemia, given above.
Treatment:
In most cases, you cannot prevent thalassemia. Thalassemia patients need special treatment under the supervision of thalassemia specialist and parents.
1. Food:
You should take care of your child’s food and daily diet, you should not give that food which contains iron. Food that you should not give to your child is listed below:
1. Pomegranates
2. Cherries
3. Mangoes
4. Apples
5. Dates
6. Dry fruits
7. Carrots
8. Potatoes
9. Egg’s yolk
10. Spicy foods(fast food)
11. Beans
12. Jambul
13. Beef
14. Fizzy drinks (7up, Red bull, C**k, Sting, Pepsi etc.)
15. Spinach
16. Large amount of tea or coffee
17. Berries
18. Pickle
So, that was the food you should not give to your dear patients or children. Now these are the foods you should give to your patients or children:
1. Bananas
2. Milk
3. Chicken
4. Grapes
5. Oranges (lemons, kinow etc.)
6. Yogurt
7. Butter
8. Mutton
9. Rice
10. Reddish (turnips, loky etc.)
11. Coconut
12. Sugarcane
2. Serious Injuries: These patients are very sensitive to any injury or disease because they cannot beer a small and common injury or disease, they cannot heal themselves quickly, their body can’t take any action against any injury or disease. It takes too much time to heal themselves. Such disease are prickly heat, fever, diarrhea etc.
So you must have to take very much care of this. Some disease are transferred to their body during blood transfusion such as hepatitis (A, B, C), Malaria, Skin disease and Syphilis etc. So you must check that the blood is highly test for these disease and does not contain any of these disease.
3. Weather Conditions:
These patients are also very sensitive to Weather Conditions, such as very hot or cold weather. So you must take a good care of it that they should not play outside in hot weather. And you must give cold things to them in summer like milk, coconut, sugarcane etc. to keep their body temperature normal.
And in winter sometimes their muscles contract and become stiff or spasm involuntarily, it is known as Spasticity, which can make it difficult to move or to response. It can be uncomfortable and painful at times. It occurs when the nerve impulses that control muscle movement are interrupted or damaged.
So you should massage their hand, foot, legs or other parts of the body that is suffering from Spasticity with olive oil (if available) and keep it warm.
4. Clinical tests:
You must consult your child’s these clinical tests after every six months:
1. Iron 2. Ferritin 3. Hepatitis [A, B, C] 4. Ultra-Sound 5. ECO
So that you can easily know about your child’s health conditions.
5. Transplant:
There are also liver transplant and Bone-Marrow transplantation for curing Thalassemia. But they are very expensive, so many people cannot afford it. But sometimes it is free in government hospitals.
Medical Instructions:
Medicines are also very important part of treatment and diagnosing. These are some medicines that are mostly given to Thalassemia patients:
1. Asunra(deferasirox):
It is an Iron Chelation medicine. It is mixed in water and then given to the patient. It’s sometimes free in Government hospitals and sometimes you must pay for it, it is also very expensive that some people cannot afford it easily. And it is not available in common drug stores.
2. Hydra (capsules):
It is also an Iron Chelation medicine. It is sometimes free and sometime you must pay for it, and is also expensive too. It is not available in common drug stores.
3. Desfrol(injections):
It is also sometimes free and sometimes you must pay for it. It is not too expensive. It is also used for Iron Chelation.
4. Folic Acid(tablets):
It is used to treat Folic Acid deficiency and some other types of Anemia (lake of red blood cells) that are caused by Folic Acid deficiency.
5. Regix(syrup):
It is an Anti-Allergy syrup which is commonly used for minimizing the risk of a reaction during a Blood Transfusion.
6. Desora(tablets):
It is also used as an Anti-Allergic tablets which is also used for minimizing the risk of a reaction during a Blood Transfusion.
7. Chewcal(tablets)(Calcium+ Vitamin D):
It is basically a chewing tablet, you must chew it otherwise it will make stones in your kidney.
8. Lisovet, Vidalin (L,M)[Syrups]
These all medicines are given according to the weight, age and abdominal size etc. of the child or patient.
Parent’s/guardian’s Responsibilities:
Parents must check these points and take care of this:
1. Wrong blood group transfusion.
2. The doctor in the ward is a Thalassemia specialist.
3. Check the Date of collection and expiration date on the blood
bag and observe it for abnormal color, RBC clumping, gas
bubbles, and other harmful materials. Immediately return
expired or abnormal blood to the blood bank.
4. Three are two main types of blood in hospitals one is Whole
Blood and the second is Packed Blood, the main difference
between Whole Blood and Packed Cell is that the Whole blood
contains the plasma, white blood cells, platelets and red blood
cells, and the Packed Cell contain only red blood cells. So you
should struggle for Whole Blood as it contain more ingredients
than the Packed Cell, and lasts for more time in the body.
5. Immediately call the specialist if gas bubbles or any other thing
appears in the Blood Transfusion Set/Wire (BT Set). And tell him
to remove the gas bubbles.
6. Check that the blood is washed and tested and negative for HIV,
Hepatitis (A, B, C), Syphilis, Malaria, Skin allergies and AIDS etc.
7. Check that the ward’s environment is very neat and clean.
8. Check that the cannula is washed before blood transfusion.
Education:
When your patient tells you that he/she is feeling well and is now happy in in his/her life, so then you can educate him/her in school, at home or at madrasa or anything he/she wants to learn.
There are so many benefits of education to them such as:
1. If they are educated so they can easily know that what is harmful and what is good for them and will avoid eating or taking harmful things, will live long.
2. They can learn any skill that they want, skill learning is too easy for them.
3. They can be freelancers, youtubers, online marketers or can write articles like me, anyway these skill doesn’t require any physical efforts.
I hope you liked to read this article and loved it.
