Rare blood group makes five-year-old girl's treatment risky in Kerala

Treatment of a five-year-old girl, who suffered a head injury last year, has become risky as she is having a rare blood group - 'P Null'.

Anushka, daughter of Gujarat native Santosh, suffered head injury after falling from the first floor of a building in July last year. She is now under treatment at the Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences in Kochi.

According to the hospital sources, now her surgical procedures were being carried out by preserving the blood taken from her.

P null phenotype blood group was earlier found in India in a patient in Manipal in 2018. Efforts to get blood from that person also did not yield result owing to that patient's health conditions.

Anushka suffered intracranial injury in the fall and she had undergone a surgery in Gujarat. Later there was infection and she was brought to AIMS for expert treatment. Doctors found that another surgical procedure was required. Then only they noticed that the girl was having a rare blood group.

AIMS public relations officer said that so far no donors could be traced. However, doctors managed to perform the surgery by taking her own blood and re-infusing it. Now the patient is recovering.

Dr N Vijayakumar, medical officer at the regional blood transfusion centre in Aluva said it was a rare phenotype where minor blood group p antigen system was absent. Hence patient would have anti p antibody. As 99.9 per cent of donors would have p antigen. It is very hard to find a compatible unit. Moreover, no blood bank in Kerala has the reagent to diagnose the blood type.