MODEL RELEASED. Health advice. Paediatrician and senior midwife giving a mother with sickle cell anaemia advice on how to care for her baby, who may have inherited the disease from its mother. Sickle cell anaemia is a genetic disorder in which there is an abnormality in haemoglobin, the oxygen-carrying pigment found in red blood cells. Abnormal haemoglobin causes red blood cells to be rigid and have a distorted shape, causing blockages in blood vessels. This can cause organ damage and pain. It is a disease which occurs largely in people of African and Caribbean descent.