Testing available for Sickle Cell

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By Moses Peraza, Daily Staff Writer Six health organizations and Alpha Phi Omega fraternity worked together Wednesday to bring free sickle cell anemia screening to the MOSAIC room located in the Student Union.

About100,000 Americans are affected with sickle cell anemia and many people know nothing or little about this life threatening disease.

Wednesday, six health organizations and Alpha Phi Omega fraternity worked together to bring free sickle cell anemia screening to the MOSAIC room located in the Student Union.

Diana Lee, executive director of sickle cell anemia community health network of Northern California, said sickle cell anemia is an inherited blood disorder that affects the hemoglobin.

Lee said that most people know their blood type, which is on the surface of a blood cell, but few people knew their hemoglobin type, which is inside the blood cell.

She said in sickle cell anemia, blood types change from a round blood cell to a half moon, or a sickle.

“This blocks other red blood cells from carrying oxygen to other part of the body,” Lee said.

Lee said this could lead to organ damage and pain.

That the only cure for the disease is a bone marrow transplant, she said

“Some times people with sickle cell anemia get blood transfusions and that does alleviates their pain for a while,” Lee said.

Lee said dehydration, high altitudes and cold could cause the cells to start sticking to the veins.

She said researchers believe that certain cultures that were susceptible to malaria developed adaptive traits. People with this adaptive trait breed with others that have the same adaptive trait, which leads to the disease.

Lee said that certain ethnic cultures were at risk for getting the disease, such as African, Central and South American and several regions in the Mediterranean.

She said people from the Philippines, Greece, the Middle Eastern and the Caribbean region were also at risk.

Eva Naredo, an organizer of the screening, said if she were pregnant there would be a 25 percent chance that she would give her unborn child the disease. Also if she were pregnant, there would be a 50 percent chance for her unborn fetus to become a carrier, and a 25 percent chance that her unborn baby would be unaffected.

Lee said that Latinos were the second most common group to be infected by the disease.

She said there were 1,000 people who were infected with the disease in California.

Since 1990, all newborns have been tested for sickle cell anemia and every year about 250 newborns are diagnosed with the disease.

She said in African countries, like Ghana, 15,000 babies are diagnosed with sickle cell anemia and in Niger, 100,000 babies were also diagnosed.

Within the first hour seven students had been screened at Wednesday’s event, Lee said.

Lee said testing blood would be taken to a children’s hospital in Oakland to be tested to see what type of trait the testee had and how many red blood cells they had.

Lauren Droira, president of Health Science Undergraduate Student Association, had her blood tested because she considered it a health related issue.

Droira said that the Student Health Center offers free X-rays and testing for those with sickle cell anemia.

The Student Health Center, The Ethnic and Cultural Heath-Peer Health Education Program, Peer Health Education Department and Health Science Undergraduate Student Association sponsored a free sickle cell anemia testing, which was also cosponsored by Alpha Phi Omega and the Masters of Public Heath Student Association. 

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