Hairy cell leukosis

Description:

Hairy cell leukosis - the rare option of a chronic leukosis which is considered independent nosological unit and is not considered now as one of kliniko-morphological options of a chronic lymphoid leukosis.
The hairy cell leukosis affects advanced and senile age more often and develops gradually. For this reason the disease often remains unnoticed and the diagnosis is made already at late stages. Average age of diagnosis of a disease of 50 years. In 75% of cases men are ill.

Symptoms of the Hairy cell leukosis:

Distinguishing character of a disease is slow increase in a spleen, or a splenomegaly, it happens because of the increased destruction in it pathological leukocytes. The splenomegaly can be shown by weight in the left half of a stomach, and at medical examination the elastic edge of the increased spleen in left hypochondrium will be palpated. Other symptoms of hairy cell leukosis - anemia and the increased tendency to infections, - develop because of suppression of a normal hemopoiesis in marrow leukemic cells. The symptoms connected with anemia and decrease in immunity are important, but are often ignored as "age" manifestations at these patients. The symptoms connected with the general intoxication at tumoral process - decrease in body weight and a loss of appetite can be other displays of a disease, it is inexplicable the increased body temperature and night sweat. Patients are more often inclined to refer all these manifestations to signs of the physical aging therefore it is not surprising that more often they see a doctor not at once.

Reasons of the Hairy cell leukosis:

The name of a hairy cell leukosis is caused by outward of the cells specific to this type of a leukosis. These cells by origin – the lymphocytes normal participating in an immune response. At a leukosis there is a change, both their forms, and functions and they cease to participate in immune responses and develop cytoplasm outgrowths which through a microscope are visible as "fragmentary" or "hairy" edges of a cell.

Treatment of the Hairy cell leukosis:

In treatment of a hairy cell leukosis apply chemotherapy. The splenectomy is in certain cases necessary for normalization of cellular composition of blood and treatment of anemia.

The splenectomy which effect at a half of patients lasts longer than 8 months was standard approach to treatment of cytopenias at a hairy cell leukosis in the past. Analogs of purines, especially кладрибин, made a revolution in treatment of this disease. Frequency of full remissions at treatment kladribiny exceeds 80%, full remission is quite often reached after the first course and often more than 3 years last. Kladribin is extremely effective at the patients receiving earlier пентостатин or interferon an alpha.

The question of a possibility of treatment of a hairy cell leukosis remains open as the minimum residual disease is found even in patients with long clinical remission.