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Scientific Breakthroughs

Recently, considerable interest has been shown in the anti-sickling property of the extracts from the root of Fagara Zanthoxyloides (orinata: Yoruba), also known as Prickly Ash Bark, which is very well known now. It can be used as chewing stick. Extracts of the roots of which in a mild red wine to which grated or blended Aloe vera.

Aloe suctrim honey is added. This is excellent in alleviating pains and stopping the crisis. Fagara Zanthoxyloides. The possibility of deriving some remedy from medicinal plants is therefore clearly exciting. Consequently, upon information based on an unrecorded report, that boiled extracts from the edible beans of Cajanus cajan (Fiofio: Ibo) of family Papilionaceae did bring enormous relief to a confirmed sickler.

Scientists have discovered the reversion of the sickle cell by Cajanus cajan. In an experiement carried out by G.I.Ekeke and F.O. Shode in August 26, 1985, boiled and crude ethanoic extracts of edible Cajanus cajan beans were prepared and used for in vitro (outside a living organism or environment) studies involving 14 individual blood samples obtained from confirmed sickle cell (Hbss) patients.

It was demonstrated that the extracts were able not only to inhibit sickling in sodium metabisulphite solution, but also quickly reverted to normal morphology, already sickle erythrocytes. There was also a noticeable improvement in the general morphology of the sickle cell erythrocytes after coming into contact withg the plant extracts.

Scientists have discovered several important breakthroughs in natural therapies for sickle cell anemia, on of which is the zinc therapy. It has been observed that some of the clinical manifestations of zinc deficiency are similar to those of sickle cell anemia: delayed onset of puberty, short stature, chronic leg ulcers.

Subsequent laboratory test demonstrated that blood levels of zinc were indeed significantly lower in sickle cell anemia patients than in healthy people. And during crises of the disease, zinc level drops even lower, according to reaearchers at the University of Tennessee Center for the Health Sciences (Journal of the American Medical Association, December 14, 1997).

Dr. Ananda S. Prasad, MD of the department of medicine at Wayne State University, Detroit, and his colleagues have found that zinc supplementation can help sickle cell patients resume normal growth. In a study reported by Clinical Research (Arpil, 1980), Dr. Prasad's patients on zinc supplementation showed weight gain, improved testosterone levels and better night vision. (Poor adaptation to darkness is typical in sickle cell disease). Zinc therapy has been shown to reduce the crippling attacks of severe abdominal pain and vomiting, which always hospitalise sickle cell victims.

Another exciting discovery concerns vitamin E, and much of what we now know is due to Kanny Chiu, Ph.D, and his colleague Bertran Lubin, MD of the children's hospital medical centre in Oakland,m California. In a report to the Federation of American Societies for Experiemental Biology in April, 1979, Dr. Chiu suggested that inadequate levels of Vitamin E in sickle cell patients' blood plasma and red blood cells may contribute to the sickling process.

In trials by Dr. Chiu, and by several other researchers, Vitamin E has shown tremendous promise as a natural therapy to narmalise cells in sickle cell patients. Incredibly, researchers have been finding that its most impressive effect so far is on irreversible sickle cell, or ISC. Dr. Chiu explains, "normally, most cells of sickle cell patients only sickle under certain circumstances; otherwise, the molecular defect isn't expressed clinically. But some cells, which we call irreversibly sickled cells, always sickle. The amount of these cells vary from one patient to another, from five to 30 percent."

Supplemental Vitamin E can reduce the percentage of ISC by more than half, according to Clayton L. Natta, MD and his colleagues at thge Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons. Of six patients who received daily doses of Vitamin E for six to 35 weeks, the average number of ISC decreased from 25 percent to 11 percent (American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, May, 1980).