Valuation of Serum Ferritin Level and Frequency of HBV and HCV Infections in Multi-transfused Major B-Thalassemia Patients Connected with Consanguinity
Authors
NELOFER JAMIL, NOUREEN KHAN, SANA BASHEER, SHABANA AKRAM, HUSSANA HAMID, MEHWISH KHALID and ZUBIA MASOOD
Abstract
As thalassemia is a genetic blood disorder across the whole world and is caused by imbalance in the synthesis of globin chains of haemoglobin and excessive breakdown of red blood cell. Thalassemia can be divided into two major categories i.e., α-thalassemia and β-thalassemia because of imbalance in the synthesis of α &β globin chains of haemoglobin. As thalassemia patient are not able to make normal haemoglobin which is necessary for the production of normal red blood cells, therefore regular blood transfusions is only treatment for thalassemia patients because it allows them to lead relatively a normal life, but during blood transfusion, patient got various infections like hypersplenism, chronic hepatitis (resulting from infection with viruses that cause hepatitis B and/or C), HIV infection, venous thrombosis, and osteoporosis, which had been proved to be lethal. Therefore, present study was conducted in thalassemia centre of Quetta city (Fatimid foundation) to estimate serum ferritin level and the incidence of Hepatitis-B (HBV) and Hepatitis-C (HCV) viral infections in multi-transfused major β- thalassemia patients in relation to their consanguinity. During the survey, a total of 100 cases were targeted, in which 50 individuals were kept in normal and 50 were affected with β- thalassemia major, which was then further categories into four ethnic and age groups, gender, age at present, age at diagnosis, blood group, pedigree, their family history and information about their sibs. The observed mean age at thalassemia diagnosis was 13 months to four years. From the obtained results, it had been observed that the mean blood serum ferritin level was found to be high (>500ng/dl) in all β- thalassemia major due to multiple blood transfusion. Furthermore, prevalence rate of Hepatitis-B virus (HBV) was 10% and the Hepatitis-C virus (HCV) was 30%, hence revealed that incidence of Hepatitis-C virus (HCV) was found to greater than Hepatitis-B virus (HBV) in thalassemia major patients. Key Words: Hepatitis-B Virus (HBV) and Hepatitis-C Virus (HCV), Serum Ferritin, β-thalassemia Major, Consanguinity.
