Frequently Asked Questions about Antibody Immunotherapy for Fetal Protection From Rh-related Hemolytic Diseases

If you’re expecting childbirth soon enough and you have a negative Rhesus factor in your blood and you’re in the dark when it comes to the effect of that if it turns out that your baby has a positive Rhesus factor, then this Q&A blogpost will serve you well in protecting yourself and your baby from hemolytic diseases that can be mild or fatal and also in your subsequent pregnancies in the future.

So what is antibody immunotherapy?

It’s the use of antibodies to override the basic functions of the immune system responses to be able to result in certain effects for the well-being of the patient, like the detection of pathogens or toxins or suppression of certain immune responses.

And how does it work?

Antibodies are proteins , and in its soluble secreted form it goes about finding antigens in pathogens or even the body’s cells that aren’t working correctly and then it binds to it , to either attack it directly or tag it so that the immune system can deal with it .

Also the B cells that produce these antibodies can differentiate into memory cells that help to remind the immune system whenever the antigen that was recognized before to be recognized again but much faster.

And what does this have to do with me if I’m pregnant and I have a negative Rh in my blood?

Rhesus factor is an antigen that’s present at the surface of red blood cells if you have a positive Rh factor , while if it’s negative , you don’t have it , and thus if your fetus has it and you don’t , and the fetus’s blood gets mixed with your system , your immune system will react to it as a foreign body and will develop antibodies to attack it based on binding with that antigen and it will also produce memory B cells to remember the antigen that was recognized whenever it presents itself again , and thus this could lead to hemolytic diseases for the new born that could be mild like anemia or fatal like heart failure , and of course the same risk in future pregnancies .

And is it possible to prevent this from happening?

In antibody immunotherapy it’s possible to do that as a form of immunosuppression that prevents this form of sensitization, and it occurs through the introduction of RhD inhibitors in the form of antibodies that prevent the production of both form of B cell production whether it’s antibodies or memory B cells, and such treatment happens before and immediately after birth to insure protection.

Global Allied Pharmaceuticals (GAP) is a pharmaceutical company, working to deliever immunotherapy services. Contact us on www.gapsos.com.