Friday, September 5, 2008
a few months back, my bro is tested positive to be a thalassaemia minor (a.k.a. carrier) thalassaemia is a disease whereby your red blood cells will be smaller than usual and will carry less oxygen. coincidentally it is a GENETIC disorder. recently my paternal grandfather is also tested positive to be a thalassaemia minor. see the link. so today dad, mum, sis and i went to kk hospital for a blood test. the nurse had to draw 2 freaking test tubes of blood. anyway she started explaining what thalassaemia is and how it affects us. apparently only 3% of the world is affected with it. wow. how lucky -.- there is 2 kinds, alpha and beta and both yixin and grandfather has alpha (which is more serious) then she talked abt the symptoms which includes slight giddiness when you stand up after sitting for too long (omg shit) and loss of breath easily (die die). which are both present in me. most prob i will be a minor too bcz alpha major patients will die stillbirth. then there are pics of major babies which looks quite gross. apparently obvious veins is also a symptom (see my hands!!!!) my bro's temples and my sis's wrists and cheeks also have the veins. looks like 3 of us tio minor liao. but it wont affect our lives much just that we have to be careful not to pass down to our offspring. so ppl that i marry should preferably not be a minor. or u can do the genetic cross to see the percentage of our offspring having thalassaemia.
what's wrong with me.. sinus.. appendicitis.. now thalassaemia.. what's next? breast cancer?
Yixuan
23:07