Suspected Thalassemia Minor / Trait

Last Saturday, I took Alycia to the clinic to have a complete blood works  done (pee tested too). For the past one year or so, her skin has turned sallow (skin skews yellow). She used to have the perfect complexion - snow skin with rosy cheeks.  I was pretty sure that she was low on iron as she's not been eating nutritiously since a year ago up until now, as she has been staying back in school almost everyday. By the time she comes home in the evening, she eats very little of what the mil cooks. She tells us that she's already eaten in school and God knows what she eats in school. I know she's a carb lover and loves pastries, buns, pau and snacks.  Whenever there's  soup, she will come up with excuses to avoid drinking it.  She dislikes soups and fish (except for salmon and cod. Expensive taste bud this girl has!). She does not like Chinese style of cooking and the mil only knows how to whip up Chinese style dishes. She tells us that she eats 'chap fan' (mixed rice) in school almost everyday and has already grown sick of Chinese style dishes. Thus, she does not have balanced meals on most week days.

At the height of having a huge fibroid with super heavy menses two years ago, I was severely anemic and my skin was sallow too. So that gave me the cue that Alycia is also low on iron. Her menses can be pretty heavy at times.  She turns a deaf ear on me whenever I ask her to eat red dates, wolfberries, beet root, drink nutritious soups and eat nutritiously. She can be pretty stubborn.

Long story short, this is Alycia's blood works report, collected today:





My guess was spot on!  Alycia's moderately anemic.  Also, her blood seems a tad 'abnormal' and at the  look of this report, the doctor opined that Alycia could have Thalassemia Minor / Trait. His advice was for me to bring the report and consult a hematologist.

Cass has a classmate whose mother is a hematologist at UMMC. When I got back from the clinic, I quickly Whatsapped the report to her and sought her opinion.  Thank God for her kind heart, she replied me very quickly and advised that an Iron Study blood works be done to see if Alycia's low on iron. If she's low on iron, then she can be treated with iron supplement. If however her blood is not low in iron, then another blood works has to be carried out to determine if she indeed has Thalassemia Trait.  No fresh blood was needed for this test as the lab can still use the sample blood that's still at the lab.  I asked our GP to go ahead with the blood test.

This aside, everything else looks good and normal.  Cholesterol reading is normal - praise Lord Alycia does not have Familial Hypercholesterolaemia (FH), an inherited condition of high cholesterol.  Blood sugar is normal, pee is clear, liver and kidney functions are A-OK and cancer marker is low.