Atherosclerotic Background of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease in Sickle Cell Diseases

Mehmet Rami Helvaci, Valeria Pappel, Kubra Piral, Mehpare Camlibel, Huseyin Sencan, Ramazan Davran, Mustafa Yaprak, Abdulrazak Abyad, Lesley Pocock

Citation: Mehmet Rami Helvaci, Valeria Pappel, Kubra Piral, Mehpare Camlibel, Huseyin Sencan, Ramazan Davran, Mustafa Yaprak, Abdulrazak Abyad, Lesley Pocock, "Atherosclerotic Background of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease in Sickle Cell Diseases", Universal Library of Medical and Health Sciences, Volume 01, Issue 01.

Copyright: This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract

Background: Sickle cell diseases (SCDs) are inborn and catastrophic processes on vascular endothelium, particularly at the capillaries. Methods: All patients were included. Results: We studied 222 males and 212 females with similar mean ages (30.8 vs 30.3 years, p>0.05, respectively). Beside chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) (25.2% vs 7.0%, p<0.001), smoking (23.8% vs 6.1%, p<0.001), alcohol (4.9% vs 0.4%, p<0.001), transfused red blood cells (RBCs) in their lives (48.1 vs 28.5 units, p=0.000), disseminated teeth losses (5.4% vs 1.4%, p<0.001), ileus (7.2% vs 1.4%, p<0.001), cirrhosis (8.1% vs 1.8%, p<0.001), leg ulcers (19.8% vs 7.0%, p<0.001), digital clubbing (14.8% vs 6.6%, p<0.001), coronary heart disease (CHD) (18.0% vs 13.2%, p<0.05), chronic renal disease (CRD) (9.9% vs 6.1%, p<0.05), and stroke (12.1% vs 7.5%, p<0.05) were all higher, and autosplenectomy (50.4% vs 53.3%, p<0.05) and mean age of mortality were lower in males, significantly (30.2 vs 33.3 years, p<0.05). Conclusion: The hardened RBCs-induced capillary endothelial damage initiates at birth, and terminates with multiorgan failures even at childhood. Parallel to COPD, all of the atherosclerotic risk factors or consequences including smoking, alcohol, disseminated teeth losses, ileus, cirrhosis, leg ulcers, digital clubbing, CHD, CRD, and stroke were higher, and autosplenectomy and mean age of mortality were lower in males which can not be explained by effects of smoking and alcohol alone at the relatively younger mean age. So autosplenectomy may be a good whereas male gender alone may be a bad prognostic factor, and COPD may have an atherosclerotic background in the SCDs.


Keywords: Sickle Cell Diseases, Hardened Red Blood Cells, Capillary Endothelial Edema, Myocardial Infarction, Stroke, Sudden Deaths, Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease

Download doi https://doi.org/10.70315/uloap.ulmhs.2023.0101002