A Survey on Sickle Cell Disease Detection and Analysis

Authors

Mrs. Kodur Srividya

Department of Computer Science and Engineering, K S Institute of Technology, Bengaluru, India (India)

Sanjana Jagannatha

Department of Computer Science and Engineering, K S Institute of Technology, Bengaluru, India (India)

Shrusti L.

Department of Computer Science and Engineering, K S Institute of Technology, Bengaluru, India (India)

Shreya S Upadhya

Department of Computer Science and Engineering, K S Institute of Technology, Bengaluru, India (India)

Article Information

DOI: 10.51244/IJRSI.2026.1305000124

Subject Category: Biomedical Engineering

Volume/Issue: 13/5 | Page No: 1353-1357

Publication Timeline

Submitted: 2026-05-09

Accepted: 2026-05-14

Published: 2026-06-03

Abstract

With increasing population numbers worldwide, sickle cell disease (SCD) continues to pose a serious global health problem, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, where close to 240,000 babies are born every year with the disease. SCD refers to a genetic disorder that leads to the distortion of hemoglobin molecules and subsequent deformity of red blood cells into rigid, sickle-like forms. The irregular blood cells block blood vessels and degenerate prematurely, causing health problems such as anemia, pain crises, infections, and organ dysfunction. It is critical to diagnose the condition early and correctly to manage and control it effectively.
Advancements in artificial intelligence and image processing have facilitated the development of automatic detection systems for SCD. Deep learning methods have shown great promise in recognizing deformities in microscopic images of blood smears with high accuracy and speed. Automatic detection models can aid healthcare practitioners through shortened diagnostic duration, reduced error rates, and easy-to-use tests in resource-limited areas. This survey paper provides an extensive analysis of deep learning solutions for the detection of sickle cell disease.

Keywords

Sickle Cell Disease, Hemoglobin Gene Mutation, Diagnostic Techniques, Red Blood Cell (RBC) Analysis, Medical Image Analysis, Image Processing

Downloads

References

1. A. Author(s). (2026). Title of the article. PMC. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6858853/ [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

2. A. Author(s). (2026). Title of the article. ScienceDirect. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S3050565826000120 [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

3. B. Sen, A. Ganesh, A. Bhan, S. Dixit and A. Goyal. (2021). Machine learning based Diagnosis and Classification of Sickle Cell Anemia in Human RBC. 2021 Third International Conference on Intelligent Communication Technologies and Virtual Mobile Networks (ICICV), pp. 753–758. https://doi.org/10.1109/ICICV50876.2021.9388610 [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

4. D. C. Rees, T. N. Williams and M. T. Gladwin. (2015). Sickle-cell disease. Blood Cells, Molecules, and Diseases, 55(1), 9–17. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bcmd.2015.04.001 [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

5. Goswami, N. G., Goswami, A., Sampathila, N., Bairy, M. G., Chadaga, K., & Belurkar, S. (2024). Detection of sickle cell disease using deep neural networks and explainable artificial intelligence. Journal of Intelligent Systems, 33(1), Article 20230179. https://doi.org/10.1515/jisys-2023-01 [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

6. H. S, S. S. S and R. Arumuga Arun. (2024). A Computationally efficient CNN-based Deep Learning Technique for Sickle Cell Detection. 2024 International Conference on Electronic Systems and Intelligent Computing (ICESIC), pp. 18–22. https://doi.org/10.1109/ICESIC61777.2024.10846167 [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

7. J. Gómez, C. M. Rosales and S. I. Montaño. (2026). Sickle Cell Anemia Prediction System in Machine Learning Based on Clinical Data. IEEE Access, 14, 46048–46062. https://doi.org/10.1109/ACCESS.2026.3674938 [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

8. Johns Hopkins Medicine. (2026). Sickle Cell Disease. https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/sickle-cell-disease [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

9. M. Abdulraheem Fadhel, A. J. Humaidi and S. R. Oleiwi. (2017). Image processing-based diagnosis of sickle cell anemia in erythrocytes. 2017 Annual Conference on New Trends in Information & Communications Technology Applications (NTICT), pp. 203–207. https://doi.org/10.1109/NTICT.2017.7976124 [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

10. M. Rees, T. Williams and M. Gladwin. (2010). Sickle Cell Disease: Current Challenges. Blood Reviews, 24(6), 247–256. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.blre.2010.07.001 [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

11. M. Zhang, X. Li, M. Xu and Q. Li. (2020). Automated Semantic Segmentation of Red Blood Cells for Sickle Cell Disease. IEEE Journal of Biomedical and Health Informatics, 24(11), 3095–3102. https://doi.org/10.1109/JBHI.2020.3000484 [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

12. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. (2026). Sickle Cell Disease. https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/sickle-cell-disease [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

13. Nigam, R., Sharda, B., & Varma, A. (2024). Comparative study of sickling test, solubility test, and hemoglobin electrophoresis in sickle cell anemia. MGM Journal of Medical Sciences, 11, 31–37. https://doi.org/10.4103/mgmj.mgmj_31_24 [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

14. T. S. Chy and M. A. Rahaman. (2018). Automatic Sickle Cell Anemia Detection Using Image Processing Technique. 2018 International Conference on Advancement in Electrical and Electronic Engineering (ICAEEE), pp. 1–4. https://doi.org/10.1109/ICAEEE.2018.8642984 [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

15. University College London. (2020). Digitized Thin Blood Films for Sickle Cell Disease Detection. UCL Research Data Repository. https://rdr.ucl.ac.uk/articles/dataset/Digitized Thin_Blood_Films_for_Sickle_Cell_Disease_Detection/12407567 [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

16. V. Jain, A. K. Dubey and A. Jain. (2024). Hybrid Deep Learning and Machine Learning Approach for Sickle Cell Disease Diagnosis Using ResNet and Random Forest Classifier. 2024 13th International Conference on System Modeling & Advancement in Research Trends (SMART), pp. 606–609. https://doi.org/10.1109/SMART63812.2024.10882544 [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

17. World Health Organization. (2026). Sickle-cell disease. https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/sickle-cell-disease [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

18. Y. Kim. (2015). Laboratory diagnosis of hemoglobinopathies. Annals of Laboratory Medicine, 35(5), 409–417. https://doi.org/10.3343/alm.2015.35.5.409 [Google Scholar] [Crossref]

Metrics

Views & Downloads

Similar Articles