Airways obstruction and pulmonary capillary blood volume in children with sickle cell disease

摘要

Reply to Letter From: Antonio Marzollo, Raffaella Colombatti, Laura Sainati.We thank Dr. Marzollo and colleagues for their interest in our work. They asked for further analysis regarding the children who had ACS episodes or received hydroxyurea treatment. Seven patients had one or more episodes of ACS, comparison of their results with the rest of the cohort revealed no statistically significant difference, but the small number of children affected by ACS meant that no confident conclusions could be reached. A nonsignificant result was also obtained when we compared the results of children who were (n = 7) or were not receiving hydroxyurea, again the small numbers mean no confident conclusions could be reached. We are grateful to Dr. Marzollo and colleagues for their appreciation of our work. We are undertaking further research regarding the relationship of pulmonary capillary blood volume and lung function in sickle cell patients and hope to publish this shortly.