Sickle Cell Awareness

"CDC is working to raise awareness about sickle cell disease. You can help by reading and sharing our resources with friends and family.

Sickle cell disease (SCD) is an inherited blood disorder that is present at birth and affects approximately 100,000 Americans. CDC is committed to studying SCD and other blood disorders in order to improve the health and care of people with these conditions.

Online Resources

• Sickle Cell Trait Toolkit is a collection of fact sheets about sickle cell trait.
• Sickle Cell Disease National Resource Directory is a listing of national agencies, specialty healthcare centers, and community-based organizations that provide services and resources for people affected by SCD. The goal of this directory is to help people find SCD services and resources. Users can search for Providers/Sickle Cell Centers, Non-Profits/Associations/Foundations, and Support Groups within their state.
• Stepping Up: A 2-part video series for teenagers & young adults with SCD shares the stories of Kevin and Calvanay about their transition to adult care, how it has affected them and how they’ve overcome challenges. Spanish transcripts of the videos are available online.
• Provider Training Video Series: “Reducing Complications of Therapeutic Blood Transfusions in Sickle Cell Disease” is a four-part educational video series for healthcare providers. Created in collaboration with the CDC and the Georgia Health Policy Center, the training series is designed to provide information about and strategies for reducing transfusion complications in people with SCD. For CME/CNE credits, go to cdc.gov/TCEOnline, click search and type in the course number and the module title. The course number starts with a ‘WD’ and is followed by 4 numbers.
• In a CDC Expert Commentary on Medscape about transfusions in SCD, Dr. Mary Hulihan, a Health Scientist in the Division of Blood Disorders at CDC discusses scenarios in which transfusions are appropriate for people with SCD, the complications associated with transfusions, and how to reduce the risk of complications from transfusions.
• SCD Resources in Spanish are available on our Spanish webpage. You can find free, informative materials on SCD, such as fact sheets and infographicsin Spanish..".

Sickle cell