In a patient hospitalized for several days with a refractory pain crisis would you ever consider transfusion, either simple or possibly exchange in an attempt to get the patient over the crisis?

Topics: Pediatric Oncology • Hematology • Sickle Cell • Pediatric Hematology • Benign Hematology

Answer from: at Community Practice

While chronic transfusion therapy has been shown to prevent acute vaso-occlusive pain episodes (see studies that used chronic transfusion to prevent primary and secondary stroke), there are limited data to determine if they are effective for treatment of acute pain caused by vaso-occlusion. There ha...

Comments

at Rush University Medical Center
Agree with the excellent answer by my colleague. O...

Answer from: at Academic Institution

The 2020 ASH guidelines provide a nice summary of what is known about this point, all in agreement with the response from Dr. @Creary. Absent compelling or even suggestive data, and given potential harms, it is difficult to routinely offer transfusion as a response to this situation. However, as poi...

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