Painful crises in sickle cell anemia

Sickle cell anemia is one of the major hereditary health problem in tropical Africa where the sickle cell gene frequency is particularly high. The disease occurs with high incidence in west,east and central Africa and this has been related to the prevalence of malaria in these regions. The classic hallmark of sickle cell anemia are episodes of vaso-occlusive crisis often with multiorgan manifestation and chronic haemolytic anemia. vaso-occlusive crisis is the most common cause of hospitalization in sickle cell disease. It affects the growth and academic performance of individual. Thus it would be quite helpful to terminate such painful episodes at a very early stage. Serum CPK,LDH and 24 hour urinary creatinine can be used as potential markers of tissue ischemia in such painful episodes.