Nearly 800 cases in city need transfusion every month
_0.jpg "Nearly 800 cases in Bengaluru need transfusion every month")
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Bengaluru: “Ninteen years ago when my son was diagnosed of Thalassemia, I had no information about the disease and surprisingly the level of awareness is the same in this regard even now,” says Santosh Kumar, committee member of Thalassemia Society of Karnataka. He was speaking about the issues in Thalassemia care to more than 75 Thalassemia children and their families from different part of the State who had gathered to express concern about its care in the city on Sunday.
Santosh spends around Rs 5,000 a month on his son. “It is very difficult to find donors and a good blood match for my son and such is the case with other parents as well,” informs Santosh. “The patients need life-long blood transfusion hence availability and safety of blood products is essential and more importantly a constant supply of quality blood is also needed every 2-3 weeks and it is the foremost hurdle in providing quality care to Thalassemia patients across the city,” says Dr Sunil Bhat, Head Pediatric Hematology, Oncology and Bone Marrow Transplantation at Narayana Health City. Surprisingly, the city witnesses some 800 cases requiring blood transfusion every month and some 1700 across the State. “The only solution to tackle these huge numbers is genetic counselling and antenatal screening checks and tests so that these numbers can be curbed,” informs Dr Bhat. Speaking about other major hurdles Dr Sunil adds, “Apart from quality blood supply which is not available, 90% of patients are sub-optimally managed.
“Another key factor is ignorance both on the part of parents and doctors who do not know much about the ideal ways to transfuse blood.” he further added,” A multi-disciplinary team of specialists is required to manage patients with Thalassemia which includes a hematologist, clinical psychologist, an endocrinologist, a social worker and a dietician. The social worker and psychologist can help the patient face challenges at different developmental stages of life. The team should work systematically and record information related to clinical events, change in treatment and overall management plans of the patient.”
( Source : dc correspondent )
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