Splenectomy proved crucial to stabilising a 60-year-old man with a severe form of autoimmune anaemia after all other treatments — including 90 blood transfusions — had failed, US doctors report.

Despite their best efforts to avoid removing the spleen, the clinicians said it led to an almost immediate resolution of the month-long “haemolytic emergency”.

The previously healthy patient presented to ED with jaundice, progressive fatigue, dark urine, and dyspnoea on exertion.

Lab tests revealed a haemoglobin count of 35g/L and a positive direct antiglobulin test for immunoglobulin G (IgG), which led to a diagnosis of primary warm autoimmune haemolytic anaemia (wAIHA) with reticulocytopenia.