hi all,
just to share my experiences. i have e beta thal and was on transfusion from the ages of 7 - 12. i am now 30. i removed my spleen when is was 28 in december 2004. my hb before i removed my spleen was very low. maybe you'll be surprised to know that i sometimes went about with a hb of 4 -5. sounds crazy i know, but the doctors said that my body has somehow adapted with this low hb. i drove, went to work and did everything normally even with such a low hb.
then after my spleen was removed (all 3kgs of it) my hb shot up to 7. now, it hovers at 6. i take penicillin everyday. when i had gone through the operation, my doctor sent me home after about three days of observation. then i started to experience these excruciating pain in my chest. i couldn't eat and started vomitting everything that went in, even water. i went back to the hospital and after an ultrasound scan, the doctors found that i had a portal vein thrombosis. that meant that my portal vein was blocked with blood clots. i was warded and put on heparin for almost a week, and then given warfarin for the next few months. it seems after my platelets jumped through the roof, they made my blood clot. it was a horrid experience. it seems that my case was the first case at the hospital, as the surgeon himself admitted to it being the first time he had experienced such a thing. after my incident, the hospital made it such that all patients who had undergone a spleenectomy were required to go for an ultrasound to check for thrombosis....
well, in the case of infections, i did experience a another terrible case in nov 2005. i was warded for three weeks for septicemia. but, i will save that story for another day.... talking about one incident is enough for me for one day.