When sickle cells cling to each other and to the walls of veins and capillaries, they prevent proper blood flow. This is what causes a pain crisis.
Imagine your veins as a garden hose. As long as nothing clogs up the hose, water is going to run normally. However, if somebody were to put something inside the hose, the water isn’t going to flow as it should. It’s kind of the same thing with your veins.
As you probably know from experience, pain crises come in many forms. They can be acute (meaning occur very suddenly) and be localized to a certain part of the body. Or, the pain can be general, meaning all over the entire body. A crisis may be mild or extremely severe, lasting minutes or hours. Pain crises can also be chronic, remaining constant for days, weeks or even months. The longest pain crisis I ever had lasted over a year.
The type of pain, the intensity, location, and frequency of pain crises can be different from patient to patient depending on things like: the severity of the disease, age of the patient, stress levels, life style, climate, weather, diet, activity level, how well you manage your illness, and other factors beyond anybody’s control.
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