Sickle cell anemia and estrogens

2002/12/24 Galarraga Aiestaran, Ana - Elhuyar Zientzia

• Anatomia/Fisiologia
• Osasuna
• Medikuntza

Sickle-shaped red blood cells cannot work like healthy ones and are destroyed, hence anemia. In addition, there is a risk of blockage of blood vessels, which causes painful crises. It is known that more crises occur in affected men and that the average life expectancy is lower than that of women with sickle cell disease. However, scientists did not know why there was that difference between the sexes.

Now, according to the Journal of the American Heart Association, the key may be in the production of a blood chemical issue. In fact, nitric oxide opens the blood vessels, so it considerably decreases the risk of obstruction. In addition, nitric oxide helps keep the vessels healthy. And women with sickle cell anemia have twice as much nitric oxide in their blood as men with the same disease.

It seems that men produce less nitric oxide and that this nitric oxide has less life time in the blood. In the experiment conducted to verify this, they were given a substance with nitric oxide and an improvement of 86% was detected in the blood flow of men, while in women the improvement was 1717%.

According to researchers, the last reason is estrogen. In fact, these hormones favor the production of nitric oxide, while in women estrogen levels are by themselves higher than in men. Therefore, the consequences of the disease are not as serious in women as in men, since they are protected by estrogens.

In short, they want to try some medicines, statins, which are used to treat heart and blood circulation problems with those who have sickle cell disease. Statins, in addition to lowering blood cholesterol levels, help produce more nitric oxide and last longer.