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Does a person who had a splenectomy in 1950 for hereditary spherocytosis require long term penicillin prophylaxis after all these years?

Associated tags: antibiotics, Infectious disease, penicillin, prophylaxis, spherocytosis, splenectomy

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Question answered:10/04/06 Warning! this question is over two years old.

The most recent UK guidelines we could find were published in 2002 by the British Committee for Standards in Haematology [1]. In relation to preventing infections they report:

“All splenectomised patients and those with functional hyposplenism should receive pneumococcal immunisation and patients not previously immunised should receive Haemophilus Influenza type b vaccine. Patients not previously immunised should receive Meningococcal Group C conjugate vaccine. Influenza immunisation should be given. Life long prophylactic antibiotics are still recommended (oral Phenoxymethylpenicillin or Erythromycin).”

Reference

1) British Committee for Standards in Haematology. Update of guidelines for the prevention and treatment of infection in patients with an absent or dysfunctional spleen. 2002 (http://www.bcshguidelines.com/pdf/SPLEEN21.pdf)

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