Diastolic Dysfunction and Pulmonary Hypertension in Sickle Cell Anemia: Is There a Role for L-Carnitine Treatment?

Publisher： Karger

E-ISSN： 1421-9662|115|1-2|91-96

ISSN： 0001-5792

Source： Acta Haematologica, Vol.115, Iss.1-2, 2006-01, pp. : 91-96

Disclaimer: Any content in publications that violate the sovereignty, the constitution or regulations of the PRC is not accepted or approved by CNPIEC.

Previous Menu Next

Abstract

Clinical manifestations of cardiovascular abnormalities in patients with sickle cell (SC) anemia are well documented. Many variables were assessed in our study before and after administration of L-carnitine to randomly selected 37 SC disease (SCD) children for a period of 6 months. Variables such as weight, height, serum ferritin levels, units of blood transfused and the number of veno-occlusive crises all showed significant improvement after the 6 months of therapy with L-carnitine. Our study also showed that cardiac diastolic function and pulmonary hypertention are common in pediatric SCD patients. These two disorders showed some improvement after L-carnitine administration. Therefore, L-carnitine deserves a rigorous large-scale randomized clinical trial to evaluate its potential benefits as treatment for SCD patients with cardiac complications.