ROANOKE TIMES 
                      Copyright (c) 1995, Roanoke Times

DATE: Tuesday, December 12, 1995             TAG: 9512120021
SECTION: EXTRA                    PAGE: 3    EDITION: METRO 
COLUMN: health notes
SOURCE: SANDRA BROWN KELLY


THE ANTI D ANTIBODY EXPLAINED

An ad that first ran in this newspaper about a week ago invited women who have Rh negative blood and who can no longer have children to be screened to determine whether they have a special antibody called anti D.

Seramune, the company that bought the ad, collects the antibody to sell to pharmaceutical companies that produce Rh immune globulin. The globulin protects the fetus of an Rh negative mother.

If a woman has anti D in her blood, Seramune will pay her $40 each time she donates blood plasma. Twice-a-week donations are possible, which means the $320 a month income promised in the ad is possible.

Also, a woman who is Rh negative but does not have the antibody might still be able to participate by agreeing to be vaccinated so that her blood will make the antibody, a Seramune spokesman said.

Seramune collects the plasma at the 31 centers owned by its parent company, Serologicals Corp. in Atlanta. The centers include the Roanoke Plasma Center on Campbell Avenue Southwest in Roanoke and a center in Lynchburg.

The screenings must be scheduled through an 800 number in Atlanta.

A good analogy to how the anti D is formed and works is what happens when a person is infected with measles, says Dr. Julien Meyer Jr., a Roanoke obstetrician-gynecologist.

``The measles virus is foreign material to the immune system so the immune system makes antibodies against it, which prevents the person from having measles again,'' he explained.

If a woman with Rh negative blood becomes pregnant by a man who has Rh positive blood, their child could have either Rh factor, but the problem only arises if the fetus is Rh positive.

When a woman is Rh negative, it means she does not carry the antibody for Rh. But a pregnant woman's blood and that of the fetus can mix in the placenta that holds the fetus to the womb wall. If that happens, the mother's body makes the antibody against the fetal blood.

Then the antibody can invade the fetus and destroy its red blood cells, causing first anemia and then heart failure, Meyer said. Solutions to this include intrauterine transfusion (replacing the baby's blood before birth) or transfusion immediately after birth.

Historically, this situation was a problem until 1968, when Rh immune globulin was first developed as RhoGAM. There are several brands of the globulin on the market now.

By giving a woman a shot of the globulin prior to pregnancy, or just after a delivery, the chance of her being sensitized is less than 1 in 1,000, so that has become standard practice, Meyer said.

Meyer also says a woman should get a shot of the globulin even if she has a miscarriage, because the addition of the antibody could make it harder to type her blood should she need a transfusion in a medical emergency.

The only time an injection of the globulin would not be called for would be when both parents are Rh negative, because then the fetus will also be Rh negative.

When bad fat happens to good people

Partially hydrogenated vegetable oils. Remember these words and look for them on the labels of low-fat foods. These are not good words, Virginia Tech professor Forrest Thye told a lunchtime audience for his recent talk at the Roanoke Valley Graduate Center.

Partially hydrogenated fat means good fat, like peanut oil, has been altered so that it is more kin to bad or saturated fats than to good fats. People shouldn't get more than 10 percent of their daily calories from saturated fat.

Thye's point: Low-fat can be a misleading label. Instead, control the intake of saturated fats, meats and butter, and make your other fats the mono- and poly unsatured kind.


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by CNB