. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2020 Dec 1.

Published in final edited form as: J Racial Ethn Health Disparities. 2019 Aug 13;6(6):1233–1243. doi: 10.1007/s40615-019-00625-5

Table 4:

Hydroxyurea Characteristics: Facilitators and Barriers

Sub-Theme	Facilitator	Barrier
Prefer to Alternatives	And I would much rather take a pill every day…than to have to sit in a room for eight hours once a month. (35, M, Current Resumed). I didn’t mind getting blood transfusions…but … prolonged blood transfusions have hazardous effects also (29, M, Current).	On the red cell exchange is when they pretty much said I don’t have to take it (34, F, Stopped) I actually preferred the transfusions over hydroxyurea (34, F, Stopped).
Ability to reduce severity of crises/Efficacy Issues and side effect concerns	If it’s going to help me stop having pain crises every other day, yeah let’s do it (34, F, Stopped). I was very much in favor of taking anything that would help me stave off the possibility of a crisis. (61, F, Current Resumed).	I didn’t believe that it was going to lessen my crises. (34, F, Never). I didn’t feel any different … so I was just like, why am I taking this medicine? (23, F, Stopped). Other than my hair. I don’t want to lose my hair. (39, F, Current Resumed). It can cause blindness, and that’s kind of what deterred me at first from it. (37, F, Stopped). I was concerned…whether it would increase the frequency of my crises and the severity (64, M, Stopped).
Ability to prevent future damage vs. cause future damage	I was told that any damage that was already done of course, it can’t repair that, but it can try to prevent any further damage. (42, M, Current Resumed).	All, the longtime usage of it, what can it do to your body (46, F, Never).
Pregnancy/After pregnancy		Having kids in the future and whether there would be any negative effects as far as having children (57, M, Never). I had already knew that hydroxyurea can cause birth defects before I got pregnant, so as soon as I felt like I was pregnant it was just like oh, no. That’s got to go. (39, F, Current Resumed).
Effect on neutrophil count		[Hematologist] took me off of it because my absolute neutrophil count was out of whack…It was too low because it was looking like I had a condition called neutropenia (48, M, Current Resumed).