Interventions for treating painful sickle cell crisis during pregnancy

Background Sickle cell disease is a group of genetic haemoglobin disorders. All over the world, about 300,000 children with these disorders are born each year. Acute sickle cell pain episodes are the most common cause of hospitalisation. Pregnancy in women with sickle cell disease is associated with an increased incidence of maternal and fetal morbidity and mortality. The painful crisis is a severe complication of this illness, and it requires several interventions: packed red cell transfusion, fluid replacement therapy, analgesic drugs, oxygen therapy and steroids; but the approach is not standardised. Objectives To assess the effectiveness and safety of different regimens of packed red cell transfusion, oxygen therapy, fluid replacement therapy, analgesic drugs, and steroids for the treatment of painful sickle cell crisis during pregnancy. Search strategy We searched the Cochrane Pregnancy and Childbirth Group's Trials Register (December 2007), the Cochrane Cystic Fibrosis and Genetic Disorders Group's Trials Register (October 2007), LILACS database (1982 to December 2007) and the following web sites: Clinical Trials.gov (http://www.clinicaltrials.gov) (December 5, 2007); Current Controlled Trials (http://controlled-trials.com/) (December 5, 2007), and Sistema de Informacion Esencial en Terapeutica y Salud (http://www.icf.uab.es/informacion/Papyrus/sietes.asp) (December 1, 2007). We also handsearched the European Haematology Association conference (June 2007), the American Society of Hematology conference (December 2007) and reference lists of all retrieved articles. Selection criteria We intended to include randomised clinical trials. Data collection and analysis We intended to summarise data by standard Cochrane Collaboration methodologies. Main results We could not find any randomised clinical trials on interventions ( packed red cell transfusion, oxygen therapy, fluid replacement therapy, analgesic drugs, and steroids) for the treatment of painful sickle cell crisis during pregnancy. Authors' conclusions This review found no randomised clinical trials on the safety and efficacy of interventions for treating painful sickle cell crisis during pregnancy. The effects of interventions need to be tested in randomised clinical trials.