Thalassemia and COVID-19: Susceptibility and Severity

AuthorSomayeh Rahimien
AuthorSaba Zakerien
AuthorMahsa Nourien
AuthorYaser Mohasselen
AuthorBahareh Karamien
AuthorSeyedeh Ozra Hosseini Jomoren
AuthorBabak Sayaden
AuthorZeinab Mohseni Afsharen
AuthorZohreh Rahimien
AuthorZahra Asadien
OrcidSaba Zakeri [0000-0003-1311-4595]en
OrcidBabak Sayad [0000-0001-8686-9986]en
OrcidZohreh Rahimi [0000-0001-7589-3307]en
Issued Date2021-12-31en
AbstractContext: COVID-19 results in an imbalance between procoagulant and anticoagulant homeostatic mechanisms that could be complicated with thrombotic events. In β-thalassemia patients, the presence of comorbidities, iron overload, adrenal hypofunction, splenectomy, and chronic hypercoagulable state might increase the susceptibility to COVID-19 and its severity. Evidence Acquisition: The search was conducted in PubMed, Web of Science, and Scopus databases for the key terms of β-thalassemia/thalassemia and COVID-19 until July 2021. Results: The survey of published observational studies (mostly multicenter and case reports) indicated a lower prevalence of COVID-19 in β-thalassemia patients compared with the general population, as well as mild to moderate COVID-19 in these patients, especially in those without comorbidity. β-Thalassemia children were susceptible to COVID-19 but with less severity compared to adults. There is no report of pulmonary embolism and thrombotic events in β-thalassemia patients with COVID-19; however, coagulation abnormality and pulmonary microembolism have been found in these patients. Conclusions: Findings could be interpreted by the presence of high hemoglobin F (HbF) levels, the advantage of hydroxyurea (HU) therapy, splenectomy, and iron chelation therapy in these patients. However, due to the low sample size and studying mainly young patients, the results should be interpreted with caution, and it still needs more studies with a larger sample size to confirm these findings.en
DOIhttps://doi.org/10.5812/ijp.119789en
KeywordBeta-thalassemiaen
KeywordSARS-CoV-2en
KeywordCOVID-19en
KeywordComorbidityen
KeywordIron Overloaden
KeywordSplenectomyen
KeywordHemoglobinopathiesen
PublisherBrieflandsen
TitleThalassemia and COVID-19: Susceptibility and Severityen
TypeReview Articleen

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