Andrea wakes up late, because the night before he went to a party with his girlfriend. He disconnects the needle and puts his desferal pump in the drawer. Then he rushes to work: he’s a computer designer and his job is quite safe, because it was granted under the law protecting thalassemia patients and other people with medical problems. Nevertheless he does not want to irritate his boss. Besides, in a few days, he will be absent, and work will pile up, as he needs to go to the hospital for his regular blood transfusion. Salvatore does not sleep well. He has a cast on his leg, which makes sleeping difficult. Playing football with his friends he broke a tibia, and it is not a first. Last time it was a rib, jumping from a wall in the countryside. He lost his job as a mechanic, recently, just as many people seem to be doing these days. Fortunately he has a pension, given to him because he has this blood disease and also because he was infected with hepatitis C virus as a child. But he’s also worried about his health. Iron has been accumulating in his organs over the years and the doctors have warned him that he can no longer skip chelation. He’s now faithfully gulping his deferiprone pills and at night he injects desferal with the pump. He’s determined to take his life back into his hands again. Marisa’s morning is always difficult, with the two children to send to school (one adopted and the other conceived, unexpectedly, just one year later) and the house to clean, shopping to do and dinner that needs to be ready when her husband comes home. She takes this new chelating pill that dissolves in water, her vitamins and prophylactic antibiotics, her aspirin, and gets ready for the day. Around noon she has an appointment for her yearly check ups: audiometric tests, an ophthalmologic examination, and abdominal ultrasound. Next week it will be the turn of the MRI to check for iron in her heart and liver. Everything seems to be going well, so far. She thinks about her life: she’s satisfied with it. Who would ever have thought that she could carry on and look like a normal woman? Certainly not her mother who kept looking at her, as a child, with eyes full of tears. And now, instead ... Just a pity about that ugly splenectomy scar on her belly.

The life of patients with thalassemia major.

BORGNA, Caterina
2010

Abstract

Andrea wakes up late, because the night before he went to a party with his girlfriend. He disconnects the needle and puts his desferal pump in the drawer. Then he rushes to work: he’s a computer designer and his job is quite safe, because it was granted under the law protecting thalassemia patients and other people with medical problems. Nevertheless he does not want to irritate his boss. Besides, in a few days, he will be absent, and work will pile up, as he needs to go to the hospital for his regular blood transfusion. Salvatore does not sleep well. He has a cast on his leg, which makes sleeping difficult. Playing football with his friends he broke a tibia, and it is not a first. Last time it was a rib, jumping from a wall in the countryside. He lost his job as a mechanic, recently, just as many people seem to be doing these days. Fortunately he has a pension, given to him because he has this blood disease and also because he was infected with hepatitis C virus as a child. But he’s also worried about his health. Iron has been accumulating in his organs over the years and the doctors have warned him that he can no longer skip chelation. He’s now faithfully gulping his deferiprone pills and at night he injects desferal with the pump. He’s determined to take his life back into his hands again. Marisa’s morning is always difficult, with the two children to send to school (one adopted and the other conceived, unexpectedly, just one year later) and the house to clean, shopping to do and dinner that needs to be ready when her husband comes home. She takes this new chelating pill that dissolves in water, her vitamins and prophylactic antibiotics, her aspirin, and gets ready for the day. Around noon she has an appointment for her yearly check ups: audiometric tests, an ophthalmologic examination, and abdominal ultrasound. Next week it will be the turn of the MRI to check for iron in her heart and liver. Everything seems to be going well, so far. She thinks about her life: she’s satisfied with it. Who would ever have thought that she could carry on and look like a normal woman? Certainly not her mother who kept looking at her, as a child, with eyes full of tears. And now, instead ... Just a pity about that ugly splenectomy scar on her belly.
2010
Borgna, Caterina
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/11392/1391356
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