Community October 01, 2008
Special Attention for Sickle Cell
Charlene Bufford, a customer service operator for AT&T, remembers pediatricians talking about her abnormal blood counts when she was a child. Only years later did she realize she had a serious problem - one day her husband gently dropped a bed sheet on her and she cried out in pain. She was 26 when she was diagnosed with sickle cell anemia and began a difficult search for a specialist who could help her manage her symptoms.
Bufford moved to West Haven and found the Sickle Cell Program at YNHH just as her more acute bouts of pain began requiring hospitalizations. "Clearly this was God's timing," she said. "Now I'm just five minutes away from the services I need to keep this disease under control."
There is no cure for sickle cell anemia, an inherited blood disease, but people with the condition can live close to normal lives with the help of good medical care. YNHH's Sickle Cell Program, which treats about 100 patients from southern Connecticut, holds a clinic every Tuesday for high-risk adults. Genice Nelson, APRN, the program's coordinator, provides health education to the community, patients, families and healthcare providers with the goal of reducing the number of hospitalizations and emergency room visits.
Pain is the predominant symptom of sickle cell, and Bufford said one of the advantages of the program is that she can call Nelson with even the most minor questions so they can devise strategies to control her pain long before it becomes severe. "It's been excellent," Bufford said, explaining that primary care physicians she consulted in the past knew too little about the disease to make a real difference. "After I was diagnosed I felt so lost with sickle cell. The people in this program reached out to me with open arms and taught me so much about how to take care of myself."
Article originally appeared in the Fall 2008 issue of the Yale-New Haven Hospital Magazine (page 16)
http://www.ynhh.org/online/magazines/fall08mag.pdf
