Sickle cell anaemia: current therapies.

Tremendous progress has been made in the treatment of patients with sickle cell anaemia. This paper emphasises the benefit of early therapy with hydroxyurea, the indication for blood transfusions including iron chelation and the role of hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. In order to offer transplantation to a larger number of patients including adolescents and young adults, it is important to find less toxic, but still effective conditioning therapy and to evaluate the feasability of using alternative donors.