If you got here, chances are you received a letter or a phone call from the Oregon state lab informing you that a newborn in your practice has Hemoglobin E trait or disease. Please read this over and direct the family to our website on Hemoglobin E for parents and caregivers, which gives similar information in non-technical language. Please call Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU) pediatric hematology/oncology clinic at the number provided in your letter if further questions persist (Since they are not a registered patient in that clinic, please do not have your patients call the clinic directly)
Before we go on, let us review hemoglobin. Each red blood cell (RBC) contains approximately 250 million molecules of hemoglobin (and we have about 25 trillion RBCs, so that is a lot of hemoglobin!). Each hemoglobin molecule is a tetramer, made up of two identical alpha globin chains and two identical beta globin chains. Hemoglobin E occurs when there is a mutation in the beta globin gene.
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If you have medical questions, please call the OHSU pediatric hematology/oncology clinic at the phone number provided in your letter from the newborn screen program. If you have other questions, please reach out to us on our “Contact Us” page.
Further reading and resources:
