Changes of Marrow Hematopoietic Progenitor Cells in Patients with Severe Aplastic Anemia after Intensive Immunosuppressive Therapy

To evaluate more precisely the degree of bone marrow hematopoietic function recovery in patients with severe aplastic anemia (SAA) after intensive immunosuppressive therapy (IST), changes of bone marrow hematopoietic progenitor cells, including late burst-forming unit-erythroid (mBFU-E) and colony forming unit-granulocyte/macrophage (CFU-GM), of patients with SAA after 1ST were observed by using the technique of semisolid culture in vitro. The results showed that the levels of mBFU-E and CFU-GM decreased significantly for all patients before IST as compared with the normal controls (P0.001); after IST, 29 responding patients showed significant enhancement of mBFU-E and CFU-GM, which were correlated well with their clinical responses; the mBFU-E levels in 12 patients and CFU-GM levels in 10 patients recovered to normal, and both mBFU-E and CFU-GM levels in 8 patients recovered to normal simultaneously. These results indicate that SAA is pathologically heterogenous and particularly related to abnormal immunity and that once the abnormal immunity suppressed, SAA patients may get complete or partial recovery of hematopoiesis.