Using Hydroxyurea to Treat Sickle Cell Disease

This week I was able to get great feedback about my piece on Sickle Cell Disease. 100 percent of my viewers believed more can be done in the treatment of Sickle Cell Disease. Those statistics alone speak volumes about what people know about Sickle Cell Disease and how important it is to keep putting more information out there. And also how important it is to educate patients and non-suffers of the disease. Another thing I learned from this week’s publication is that I was missing the other side of the story. Hydroxyurea is the only drug used to treat Sickle Disease according to the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute. But the drug does have side affects according to Medicinenet.com, “Cancers have been reported with the use of this medication but it is not known if these cancers are due to the drug or the disease being treated.” Because of the feedback I also did some checking on social media to find out what other people and organizations have to say about the drug. Bristol-Myers issued new safety information about the drug that could eliminate the drug in some patients treatment plan. Check out the video they posted with the warning and how the drug should be taken.

I also left out how Hydroxyurea works. According to Children’s Hospital Vanderbilt the drug, “prevents hemoglobin S from sticking together and decreases the sickling of red blood cells.” The site does go on to say Hyrdroxyurea is not the type of drug that works in one or two doses. “The effect of Hydroxyurea will be felt after one or two months” according to Children’s Hospital Vanderbilt. Patients will begin to feel more energetic and the site claims the maximum affects of the drug should be felt in about 6 months. Check out a diagram of how Hydroxyurea works to keep red blood cells from sickling.

Thanks to the great feedback without it I would have never found the great information about the side effects and more information of how the drug works in the body.