Hemolytic disease of the newborn overview
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Editor-In-Chief: C. Michael Gibson, M.S., M.D. [1]
Overview
Haemolytic disease of the newborn is an alloimmune condition that develops in a fetus, when the IgG antibodies that have been produced by the mother and have passed through the placenta include ones which attack the red blood cells in the fetal circulation. The red cells are broken down and the fetus can develop reticulocytosis and anaemia. This fetal disease ranges from mild to very severe, and fetal death from heart failure (hydrops fetalis) can occur. When the disease is moderate or severe, many erythroblasts are present in the foetal blood and so these forms of the disease can be called erythroblastosis fetalis (or erythroblastosis foetalis).