As shown in Table 2, the total as well as the average number of significant painful episodes experienced by the subjects and the controls before their recruitment were not statistically different (p=0.665). Also, the number of subjects and the controls with clinical jaundice, hepatomegaly, and splenomegaly at recruitment were statistically similar (p>
0.05). The number of previous admissions and transfusion were similar among the two groups of children with SCA.