Pancytopenia is a condition that occurs when a person has low counts for all three types of blood cells: red blood cells, white blood cells, and platelets.
Pancytopenia is usually due to a problem with the
bone marrow that produces the blood cells. However, there can be several different underlying causes
Pancytopenia is the simultaneous presence of anemia, leucopenia and thrombocytopenia. Therefore it exists when Hemoglobin (Hb) is less then 13.5g/dl in males or 11.5g/dl in females; the leucocytes count is less then 4x103/l and the platelets count is less than 150x103/l.1 Initially, mild impairment in marrow function may go undetected and
Pancytopenia may become apparent only during times of
stress or increased demand (e.g., bleeding or infection). Varieties of
hematopoietic and non-hematopoietic conditions manifest with features of
pancytopenia. The underlying mechanisms are: decrease in
hematopoietic cell production, marrow replacement by abnormal cells, suppression of marrow growth and differentiation, ineffective hematopoiesis with cell death, defective cell formation which are removed from the circulation,
antibody mediated sequestration or destruction of
cells and trapping of
cells in a hypertrophied and over active reticuloendothelial system
Relevant Topics in Medical Sciences
