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The amount of oxygen the blood loses when traveling through the brain could help identify children with sickle cell disease who are at risk of having a stroke, a study reports. Scientists call the measurement the oxygen extraction fraction because it refers to the percentage of oxygen that the brain…

Novo Nordisk has obtained worldwide rights to EpiDestiny’s sickle cell disease treatment EPI01. The disease-modifying therapy, consisting of decitabine and tetrahydrouridine, is aimed at  helping patients increase fetal hemoglobin levels to replace the hemoglobin that’s defective in the disease. The idea is to prevent red blood cells from becoming sickle-shaped,…

A little-known government entity within the National Institutes of Health (NIH) is helping to lead U.S. efforts to speed up the development of therapies for some 7,000 rare diseases. The Office of Rare Diseases Research (ORDR), headquartered in Bethesda, Maryland, was established in 1993 within the NIH Office of the…

Researchers have pinpointed a specific genetic profile that could help identify sickle cell disease (SCD) patients who are at risk for developing acute chest syndrome (ACS), a common and severe complication of SCD. One of the major hallmarks of SCD is hemolysis – or breakdown of red blood cells –…

The European Medicines Agency recently granted orphan drug status to Sancilio Pharmaceuticals’ Altemia for the treatment of sickle cell disease (SCD) in pediatric patients, the company announced. Altemia is a specific formulation of lipids designed to replenish the elements needed for healthy red blood cells that are damaged…

Researchers used a gene editing tool to insert mutations into blood cells to increase their production of fetal hemoglobin, which may advance the development of new therapies for sickle cell anemia. The study, “Natural regulatory mutations elevate the fetal globin gene via disruption of BCL11A or ZBTB7A binding,” was…

A team of researchers led by HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology and the Clinical Sequencing Exploratory Research (CSER) consortium found that genome sequencing enabled the diagnosis of almost 30 percent percent of children with unexplained developmental delay or seizures. Some of the participants carried genetic…

Researchers found that inhaled corticosteroids (ICS) given at the time of hospital admission did not improve outcomes in children with sickle cell disease (SCD)-associated acute chest syndrome. The study, “Early initiation of inhaled corticosteroids does not decrease acute chest syndrome morbidity in pediatric…

Patients with sickle cell disease show the highest rates of readmission and hospitalization within 30 days of being discharged from an emergency department, a single-center study found. The study, “Patients Discharged From the Emergency Department After Referral for Hospitalist Admission,” was published in The American Journal of Managed…

Negative experiences with a racial connotation are common among adolescents and young adults with sickle cell disease (SCD), Connecticut Children’s Medical Center researchers showed in a recent study. In the United States, sickle cell affects mainly African-Americans, and is historically perceived in the medical community as a “black disease.”…