End Sickle Cell Campaign
-Road Map-

Our Idea

Our idea of a systematic reduction and eventual elimination of the conception of offspring that present with SCD is premised on our vision of a Sickle-Cell-free society, which will forever escape the painful living reality that sickle cell warriors battle with daily and the millions of dollars spent on care and treatment.

Our Approach

Our approach is both practical and achievable if we all come together as governments, religious organizations, civil society bodies, and the general public, in through a public-private-partnership model.

The approach is three-step.

Mass Screening
Status registry (through the Life Registry)
Compatibility checking for intending couples

1. Mass Screening

a) Rapid Self-screening

This will involve the client getting access to a rapid testing kit. The kit includes the testing strip and an instruction leaflet. Included in the leaflet are instructions on how to access and download the LifeBlood App. The LifeBlood App is the mobile app that makes it possible for the interested person to capture a digital record of the outcome of the test. The process is very simple and involves self-pricking and drawing of blood, which is placed on the strip for a few seconds to determine the outcome.

b) Rapid Health-Worker-assisted screening

This is similar to a) above, only in this case, the individual does not draw blood on their own, but walks to a testing center and gets assisted by a health worker. In this case, it is the health worker that opens the kit and performs the process. There are two possible ways of capturing the result into the client's digital health wallet (The LifeBlood App). The health worker could pass on the results to the client, who then uploads them to their wallet or the health worker could download the LifeBlood app from Google Play Store, self-enroll as a provider, and after the account is approved, either enroll the client or search for the client (if they already possess a LifeHealth account). This is then followed by the step where the provider searches for the patient's name or unique ID and navigating to his/her profile and updating the Sickle Cell section.

c) Lab-based screening

This is where an individual walks to a lab for blood tests such as full count of blood cells, Hb electrophoresis, and high-performance liquid chromatography. In order to get the results to feed into the Life Registry, the lab will share the results with the client, who then uploads to their LifeBlood App

2. Status registry

This step happens automatically. The profile of the individual that has self-tested (or been tested) and uploaded their results is added to the registry in real-time. The Life Registry is a centralized pool of client profiles who have undergone a sickle cell test with known results.

3. Compatibility checking for intending couples

The registry is embedded with a match-making algorithm that calculates and determines conjugal compatibility (or incompatibility) based on any two client profiles (male vs female) already existing in the registry. Example: Barnabas intends to marry Kate. Following an awareness campaign of what Sickle Cell Disease is, how it comes about, and how it can be prevented, at their college campus two years ago, Barnabas and Kate tested for SCD. Today, Barnabas and Kate have been dating for six months now and have come to a decision to get married. They decide to run a compatibility check. They navigate to the Life Registry website and key in their names and unique IDs (generated by the LifeHealth application). They click "Check Compatibility". After a few seconds, the result is displayed on the screen. The good news is; they are a compatible couple, meaning that they are 100% sure that their offspring will be free of SCD.

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End Sickle Cell Campaign -Road Map-