Dr Ahmar Zaidi on Efforts Needed to Address Complications of Sickle Cell Disease

Ahmar Zaidi, MD, pediatric hematologist-oncologist, Comprehensive Sickle Cell Center, Children's Hospital of Michigan, discusses the need for more efforts from both the medical community and regulators to address the psychosocial complications of sickle cell disease.

Transcript

Do you think more needs to be done to prevent complications of sickle cell disease?

I think that sickle cell disease often gets misclassified as just a biological disorder. It’s truly a biopsychosocial disease, and as such, I think a lot of the complications are driven by the psychosocial component. I don’t think we’re doing nearly enough to address that psychosocial issue. We definitely are doing a lot on the biological side with the new therapies that are coming out, but addressing really the social determinants of health, the psychological toll of having a devastating, debilitating disease like sickle cell disease is something that we need to address as a medical community and I think we could be doing a better job with that.

Is this something that needs attention from not just the medical community but also the regulators?

Absolutely, I think that both sides need to come together and figure out how to take care of a population that has been basically forgotten for a large part of the last century. I think that it will require an open line of communication between both sides.