Name: Prashanth Salur

Hi Everyone,
This is just to provide some awarness about a blood disorder called thalassemia which most people are not aware and can cause a major disease to the offspring. Me and my wife had an arranged marriage about 5 yrs back and we live in US. My wife is pregnant now and the last 1 month was really a nightmare waiting for the test results. During the regular checkups with her OBGYN, they did a routine blood test and the doctor saw that her red blood cells were smaller in size than usual which is consistent with a type of anemia called thalassemia. This is very common among people of south asian decent like india, pakistan, bangladesh etc. So the doctor suggested that I get my blood work done. It turned out that I had thalassemia too and this is what most people don' t know. There are 2 types of thalassemia (thalassemia minor & thalassemia major) Me and my wife have thalassemia minor. If both parents have thalassemia minor, there is 25 chance that their offspring can have thalassemia major, 50 chance that the baby can have thalassemia minor and 25 chance that the baby will not have any thalassemia. Thalassemia major is a terrible disease which is fatal. Max life span of the baby will be atmost 20 or even less and that too the baby will need blood transfusions every month and other complications can be caused. This is a cause of concern if both parents have thalassemia minor. If either one of the parents is normal there is no reason to worry. Fortunately, our baby fell in the 25 where it did not inherit any thalassemia causing genes but its a good idea to know it before hand. There are tests that can be done as eary as 10th week called Chronic Viral Sampling (CVS) and Aminocenthesis done between 16th and 20th week to determine the type of thalassemia the baby inherited. So the would be parents can make an informed decision after consultation with the doctors and counsellors. Most parents in india do not know about this and they go into a state of shock after learning that their baby has thalassemia major and get devastated. I want to just create awareness among couples trying to have a baby so that they can talk to their doctors to find out if both have thalassemia minor or not and if so go for further test I mentioned above based on their pregnancy week.

For more information do a google on Thalassemia.

Best Wishes,
Prashanth

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