Objective: In order to manage the varied pathophysiological features of sickle cell disease (SCD), an array of drugs has to be used. The specific drugs used, however, depend on the locality. This study was aimed at finding out the drug regimen prescribed by clinicians to sickle cell disease patients who attended a Sickle Cell Clinic in Kumasi, Ghana. Method: The setting for the study is the Sickle Cell Clinic at the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital, Ghana, and a questionnaire was used as the study instrument. Information on drug prescription on each day of clinic visit was extracted from the medical records of the patients. Results: The drugs prescribed were “routine drugs” for SCD patients, analgesics, narcotics, anti-malarials, antibiotics, haematinics and miscellaneous drugs. The top ten commonly prescribed drugs were folic acid, diclofenac, ibuprofen, B-complex, routine drugs, artesunate/amodiaquin, paracetamol, penicillin V, amoxiclav and zincovit. Conclusion: Within the year, the drugs prescribed included those that could prevent vitamin and zinc deficiency due to continuing haemolysis, those that could mitigate the pain and inflammation from vaso-occlusion and reperfusion injury, as well as antibiotics to combat infections. Being a malarial-endemic region, prophylaxis with daraprim and symptomatic malaria fever therapy were common practices. This study has thus shown that the well-being of SCD patients in our typical tropical terrain, depends on haematinic vitamin/mineral supplements, anti-malarials, analgesics-anti-inflammatory, antipyretics and antibiotics.
Due to the instability of the mutant HbS which polymerises when deoxygenated to render the red cell non-deformable, SCD subjects are characterized by episodic vaso-occlusive crises, marked by ischaemia, reperfusion injury, inflammatory changes, vasculopathies and complications of organ damage [
Thus, a SCD patient reports to a health care facility, with pain as the most common clinical problem [
The heterogeneity of the clinical expression of SCD patients [
From October 2006 to date we have been undertaking studies on sickle cell patients. This present study focused on drug prescriptions to sickle cell patients between the ages of 5 to 20 years. On the day of recruitment into the study, following the examination by the attending clinicians, the subjects were grouped into either the crisis or steady state.
Each patient has a file in which the medical records are kept in the hospital, but are retrieved when patients report to the hospital for consultation. The relevant information for the preceding twelve months was extracted, including age, place of residence, the presenting clinical state, the number of previous visits and the clinical conditions during all the visits, likewise the drugs prescribed by the doctor.
Using 92 SS females (61 in crisis and 31 in steady state), as a representation of the study group,
Type of drug | Frequency |
---|---|
Folic acid | 157 |
Diclofenac | 88 |
Ibuprofen | 77 |
Routine drugs | 80 |
Zincovit | 66 |
B-complex | 66 |
Paracetamol | 50 |
Plasmotrium | 42 |
Daraprim | 49 |
Amoxiclav | 47 |
Camoquin | 32 |
Artesunate | 27 |
Penicillin V | 12 |
Artesunate/amodiaquine | 11 |
Morphine | 12 |
Bencozinc | 15 |
Amoxicillin | 13 |
Ciprofloxacin | 12 |
the list of 18 most commonly prescribed drugs. The females of the SS genotype were chosen as they made the highest number of visits, 346, within the study period. The SS males made 316 visits. The most frequently prescribed drug was folic acid; followed by diclofenac, then “routine drugs” and ibuprofen. The routine drugs, before the adoption of use of mosquito nets included folic acid, daraprim and penicillin V, but where mosquito nets are used, daraprim prophylaxis is discontinued. It has to be pointed out that there were other drug combinations prescribed as routine drugs, such as folic acid/B-complex/daraprim or folic acid/zincovit/daraprim, depending on the clinician in attendance. Apart from the two main specialist pediatricians (D. A and A. O. A), there were other medical doctors, who came to assist quite often, particularly when the attendance to the clinic was high. Sometimes, the attendance could be as high as 150 patients in one clinic session.
The prescribed drugs could be classified based on their therapeutic effect or pharmacological action, and the frequency of prescription. Based on the therapeutic effect, the common drugs used fall under five major groups; analgesics/narcotics, anti-inflammatory, anti-malarials, antibiotics and vitamins/mineral supplements (
Based on frequency, we grouped the drugs into three; the most commonly prescribed in the previous 12 months (from ten times and above), the less frequently prescribed and the least prescribed (one-off prescriptions). The least frequently prescribed were mostly alternatives to the main drugs, while a few others were to exert other pharmacologic actions, different from those specified in
As shown in
The drugs prescription, in the main, was uniform in the sense that the patients of both sexes of all the SCD genotype were given drugs to cater for similar aberrant phenotypic expressions. Thus, there were the drugs to take care of pain and accompanying inflammation (analgesics and anti-inflammatory drugs), anti-malarial drugs and antibiotics.
Analgesics/narcotics | Anti-malarials |
---|---|
Paracetamol | Daraprim Ibup |
Morphine | Artes/amdq |
Camoquin | |
Anti-inflammatory | Antibiotics |
Ibuprofen | Penicillin V |
Diclofenac | Amoxicillin |
Ciproflox | |
Amoxiclav | |
Vitamin suppl’ | Mineral suppl’ |
Folic acid | Bencozinc |
B-complex | Zincovit |
Ibup: ibuprofen; artes: artesunate; amdq: amodiaquin; suppl’: supplement.
Type of drug | |
---|---|
Anti-malarial | Antibiotic |
Amodiaquin 5 | Flucloxacin 9 |
Proguanil 4 | Zinnat 3 |
Artemos 3 | |
Analgesic | Haematinic |
Parafin forte 6 | Fersolate |
DF 118 2 | |
Pethidine 4 | Sedative |
Glucosamine 2 | Amytal 3 |
Trumadol 2 | |
Antacid | Anti-histamine |
Mg trisilicate 2 | Cetrizine 3 |
Topical application | Vit suppl’ |
Germidine cream 2 | Multivite 3 |
Workadine ointment 2 | |
Rehydrating agent | |
Oral rehydrating salt 2 |
Vit suppl’: vitamin supplement.
Type of drug | |
---|---|
Anti-malarials | Antibiotics |
Alaxin | Augmentin |
Nivaquin 442 | Doxacillin |
Coarsucan | Erythromycin |
Fansidar | Chlorampenicol |
Gentamicin | |
Analgesic | Haematinic |
Nalcofen | Fex up R |
Nimsulide | MB forte |
Toradol | Fofax |
Ciclavit | |
Antacid | Anti-histamine |
Gastracid | Phenergan |
Nugel | Rhizin |
Piriton | |
Neodeva | |
Cough mixture | Antihelmintic |
Mucolex | Zentel |
Berylin cough mixture vermox | |
Sedalyn cough mixture | |
Zedek | |
Sedative | Appetiser |
Diazepam | Lysatone |
Intestinal antiflagylate | Anti-scabies |
Metrolex | Tetmosol |
A closer study of the list of 18 frequently prescribed drugs in
Most of the less commonly prescribed drugs, as well as the occasionally prescribed drugs could be alternatives that could be used for one or two of the outlined functions, or they could complement these function. For example, if in spite of taking folic acid, B-complex and zincovit, a patient was still anaemic, then a haematinic, could be prescribed, examples being fersolate, MB forte.
Being two anti-inflammatory analgesics, diclofenac and ibuprofen were not prescribed concurrently to patients. Both are non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, which have the ability to reduce the synthesis of prostangladins and leukotrienes, but whereas Ibuprofen is a derivative of phenyl propanoic acid, diclofenac is a derivative of phenylacetic acid [
Daraprim is pyrimethamine, a known inhibitor of dihydrofolate reductase of malaria parasites. Penicillin V is a narrow spectrum β-lactam antibiotic, which has the advantage of being administered orally.
The inclusion of folic acid in the routine drug regimen is in the light of SCD patients having higher physiological requirements for folic acid due to accelerated erythropoiesis [
Varying drug regimen were used to treat symptomatic malaria fever. At present, the first line treatment for malaria is a combination of amodiaquin and artesunate. However, before this combination therapy was adopted by Ghana’s Ministry of Health in 2005, some prescriptions based on monotherapies of amodiaquin, artesunate and other anti-malarials like camoquin and plasmotrium were given. Other less commonly used anti-malarials were proguanil, artemos, alaxin and camosunate. In a Kenyan study, the anti-malarial prophylaxis used was proguanil [
Yet another group of commonly used drugs were those containing zinc supplements, particularly zincovit, and to a small extent, bencozinc. In SCD, there is inefficient protein utilization, which could be partially linked to zinc deficiency, as about 60% - 70% of adolescent and adult SCD subjects are zinc deficient [
Vaso-occlusive crisis, characterized by pain and inflammation is the hallmark of SCD [
The non-sterodal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) are anti-inflammatory, antipyretics and analgesics, and are also used for osteoarthritis, rheumatoid conditions and other joint disorders [
Apart from penicillin V, other antibiotics used were flucloxacillin (fluclox and amoxicillin), ciprofloxacin, gentamycin and augmentin. fluclox and amoxacillin are semi-synthetic penicillin; cipro is a 4-quinolone, gentamycin, an aminoglycoside, while augmentin is a physical mixture of clavulinic acid and amoxicillin [
Some of the other drugs and their mode of action are as follows; zentel (containing albendazole) for intestinal parasites, some cough mixtures like zedex, sedalyn and berylin, for respiratory tract infections. To take care of cases of hypersecretion of HCl, antacids like gastracid, acinil (cimitidine) were prescribed. Urticaria, skin rashes and other allergies were treated with rhizin (cetrizine), tetrasil, piriton, as well as some topical preparations like wokadine ointment and germidine cream. The use of neodeva eye cream was for an opthamological problem.
From
On the other hand, there is no problem of resistance associated with the use of the anti-inflammatory agents and the vitamin/mineral supplements, and in some cases, there are no alternatives; for example folic acid. Thus the number of choices for these drugs is more relatively limited.
In a study in UK [
An earlier account on the management of SCD patients by Konotey-Ahulu at the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital in Accra [
Pathophysiologically, morbidity in SCD results from sickling, dehydration of red cells, inflammation, adhesivity to the endothelium and pro-coagulant state [
In our setting, this study has shown that the SCD patients also use folic acid and penicillin, together with anti-malarial prophylaxis. They also use pain-relieving and anti-inflammatory agents, while those who develop malaria used the appropriate prescribed therapies.
What is unique in our report is the ranking of the commonly used drugs by SCD subjects in a tropical environment in which the well known vaso-occlusive pathology is aggravated by malaria and other infections.
This retrospective study of drug prescription pattern for SCD patients, covering a twelve-month period in a tropical environment has shown folic acid prophylaxis as the most common prescription, followed by diclofenac, an analgesic NSAID drug. Other important drugs were daraprim for malaria prophylaxis and artesunate/ amodiaquin and a range of symptomatic anti-malarial drugs. Some commonly used antibiotics were penicillin V and amoxicillin. The study has therefore, shown that the well-being of SCD patients in a typical tropical terrain, depends on haematinic vitamin/mineral supplements, anti-malarials, analgesics/anti-inflammatory/antipyretics and antibiotics.