Chronic parvovirus infection mimicking myelodysplastic syndrome in a child with subclinical immunodeficiency.
OBJECTIVE
We present a report of a child with subclinical immunodeficiency who became chronically infected with parvovirus resulting in pancytopenia and morphologic abnormalities in the bone marrow mimicking myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS).


METHODS
An 8-year-old boy presented with severe anemia, moderate thrombocytopenia and granulocytopenia. The patient showed hyper-immunoglobulin M (IgM) immunodeficiency but no increased susceptibility to infections. The bone marrow was hypercellular with dysplastic granulocytopoiesis and erythroblastopenia.


RESULTS
Treatment with cyclosporine and i.v. Ig resulted in temporary normalization of the hemoglobin level. For several years it was assumed that the patient had MDS. A diagnosis of parvovirus infection was initially rejected due to the lack of specific antibodies and the absence of giant pronormoblasts in the bone marrow. When the polymerase chain reaction technique became available, parvovirus DNA was detected from the entire disease course.


CONCLUSIONS
This case report expands our conception of the clinical spectrum of parvovirus infection and emphasizes that parvovirus must be considered as a differential diagnosis in MDS. We recommend performing a parvovirus DNA test despite negative serologic findings in patients with MDS, especially when associated with immunologic abnormalities.
Department of Pediatrics, Odense University Hospital, Denmark.
H
H
Hasle
G
G
Kerndrup
B B
BB
Jacobsen
E D
ED
Heegaard
A
A
Hornsleth
S T
ST
Lillevang
D002648:Child; D002908:Chronic Disease; D003937:Diagnosis, Differential; D016731:Erythema Infectiosum / Q000175:diagnosis; D006801:Humans; D007075:Immunoglobulin M / Q000097:blood; D007153:Immunologic Deficiency Syndromes / Q000150:complications*; D008297:Male; D009190:Myelodysplastic Syndromes / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000821:virology; D010322:Parvoviridae Infections / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000276:immunology; D016732:Parvovirus B19, Human / Q000302:isolation & purification
D007075:Immunoglobulin M