The Effect of Aspirin on Sickling and Oxygen Affinity of Erythrocytes

The recent suggestion that the administration of aspirin might be useful in the treatment of sickle-cell anemia has been further studied and found to be without basis. After incubation with aspirin, sickle-cell erythrocytes are not inhibited from sickling after deoxygenation. In addition, although aspirin does transfer the acetyl group to hemoglobin both in vitro and in vivo, in our experiments the reaction does not result in any alteration in the oxygen equilibrium of either intact erythrocytes or hemoglobin in solution. Furthermore, patients maintained on long-term aspirin administration also showed no shift in the oxygen affinity of their blood.