Women most protected from the consequences of sickle cell anemia

2003/02/01 Elhuyar Zientzia Iturria: Elhuyar aldizkaria

• Medikuntza

The key is that the effects of sickle cell anemia are more severe in men than in women is in nitric oxide in the blood, according to the Journal of the American Heart Association.

Sickle cell disease is an inherited disease characterized by the presence of sickle-shaped red blood cells. These distorted red blood cells sometimes obstruct blood vessels causing painful crises, especially in men. Women, for their part, have some protection: they suffer less crisis and life expectancy is greater than that of men. Now scientists have discovered whether that difference between sexes is due to the saw.

It seems that nitric oxide opens the blood vessels, so the risk of obstruction decreases considerably. And women with sickle cell anemia have twice as much nitric oxide in their blood as men with the same disease. The last reason is in estrogen. In fact, estrogens promote the production of nitric oxide, a hormone more abundant in women than in men. Therefore, the consequences of the disease are not as serious in women as in men, since they are protected by estrogens.