title: Remission of hypoplastic acute leukemia by low dose Ara-C: one case report.
abstract: The occurrence of hypoplastic acute leukemia is widely recognized as an atypical leukemia, and is defined as hypocellular marrow with more than 30% blasts and none or few blasts in the circulating blood. The pathogenesis of hypoplastic acute leukemia is still unknown. Clinically, it usually follows a less progressive course and has a high prevalence rate among the elderly. The treatment and prognosis remains unclear. We present a case of hypoplastic acute leukemia, which responded well to low dose Ara-C. The 67 year-old female patient had symptoms of bruising easily and dizziness for about 3 years. Initial investigation revealed pancytopenia in the circulating blood and hypocellularity (10%) with blast cells (60%) in the bone marrow. Besides supportive treatment with blood transfusions and antibiotics, chemotherapy of low dose Ara-C 10 mg/m2 was administrated for 14 days by subcutaneous injection. Bone marrow examination revealed an increase of cellularity and a decrease of blast cells following chemotherapy. Anemia and thrombocytopenia also simultaneously improved. Such results may suggest induction of differentiation effect of low dose Ara-C in hypoplastic leukemia.
authors.affiliation: Department of Internal Medicine, Kaohsiung Medical College, Taiwan, Republic of China.
authors.forename: S Y
authors.initials: SY
authors.lastname: Wei
authors.forename: S F
authors.initials: SF
authors.lastname: Lin
authors.forename: T P
authors.initials: TP
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.forename: H W
authors.initials: HW
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.forename: C S
authors.initials: CS
authors.lastname: Chang
authors.forename: T C
authors.initials: TC
authors.lastname: Lin
mesh_terms: D000208:Acute Disease; D000368:Aged; D003561:Cytarabine / Q000008:administration & dosage*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007938:Leukemia / Q000188:drug therapy*; D012074:Remission Induction
chemical_list: D003561:Cytarabine