Table 3.

Relationship between foetal haemoglobin levels, socio-demographic and clinical burden of children with sickle cell anaemia.

Demographic and clinicalburden	Low HbF (N = 66)	High HbF (N = 39)	Pvalue	Mean ± SD HbF	P value
Age group (years)
1 – 5	16 (45.7)	19 (54.3)		12.1 ± 6.1
6 – 10	36 (72.0)	14 (28.0)	0.036***	8.9 ± 5.5	0.024*
11 – 15	14 (70.0)	6 (30.0)		8.3 ± 6.2
Gender
Male	46 (78.0)	13 (22.0)	<0.001	8.0 ± 5.6	<0.001**
Female	20 (43.5)	26 (56.5)		12.2 ± 5.8
Social class
I	7 (77.8)	2 (22.2)		9.1 ± 6.3
II	15 (65.2)	8 (34.8)	0.527	10.0 ± 6.2	0.877*
III	22 (66.7)	11 (33.3)		9.4 ± 5.6
IV	22 (55.0)	18 (45.0)		10.4 ± 6.4
Frequency of painepisodes
<3	33 (57.9)	24 (42.1)	0.251	10.7 ± 6.5	0.147**
≥3	33 (68.8)	15 (31.2)		8.9 ± 5.3
Frequency of transfusion
<3	65 (62.5)	39 (37.5)	0.334***	9.9 ± 6.0	0.808**
≥3	1 (100)	0 (0)		8.4
Frequency of hospital admission
<3	65 (64.4)	36 (35.6)	0.116***	9.8 ± 6.1	0.347**
≥3	1 (25.0)	3 (75.0)		12.7 ± 3.3
SCD severity
Mild SCD	41 (56.2)	32 (43.8)		10.8 ± 6.0
Moderate	25 (78.1)	7 (21.9)	0.032	7.7 ± 5.6	0.013**

^*Analysed by ANOVA;

^**independent sample t-test;

^***Fisher’s exact test applied;

The figures in parentheses are percentages of the total across each row.