A patient at a hospital in north London was one of the first to benefit from a ground-breaking sick cell test.
Stephanie George, 32, received a genetic test to better match her blood transfusions at the Whittington Hospital.
The test for sickle cell disease, which is more common in people of black African and Caribbean heritage, was rolled out across the NHS on Monday (January 22) in a world first.
Life-saving transfusions are commonly used to treat rare inherited blood disorders, but after transfusion, around a fifth of patients develop antibodies against certain blood groups.
They can then experience delays to treatment due to the difficulty in finding enough matching blood and sometimes blood transfusion reactions.
One sickle cell patient, Ama Aryee, a 34-year-old science teacher from Cheshunt in Hertfordshire, said she developed antibodies after emergency blood transfusions.
She said: “I definitely support people getting their blood groups tested – if I’d had this test several years ago before my transfusion, I might not have antibodies now.
“And if this new testing could help people like me receive blood again that would be wonderful.”
In England, around 17,000 people are living with sickle cell disorder, which can result in severe organ damage and intense pain if damaged red blood cells block vessels and restrict oxygen supply.
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