Fazlur Rahim, Irshad Ahmad, Saiful Islam, Muhammad Hussain, Taj Ali Khan Khattak, Qudsia Bano.
Spectrum of hematological disorders in children observed in 424 consecutive bone marrow aspirations/biopsies.
Pak J Med Sci Jan ;21(4):433-6.

Objectives: To study the spectrum of hematological disorders in children at a tertiary care centre in Peshawar NWFP. Settings: This study was conducted at the department of Child health and the department of Pathology of Khyber Teaching Hospital Peshawar. The study period was from January 2001 to December, 2003. Design: This was a retrospective study. Methods: A retrospective analysis of charts of those patients who underwent bone marrow examination (aspiration/trephine) was made. Charts were analyzed in detail regarding history, examination and investigations. All findings were entered on a standard proforma. Results: A total of 424 patient`s case histories including bone marrow examination results were analyzed. Nutritional anemias contributed 138 (32.55%) cases amongst the non-hematological group. Out of nutritional anemias, megaloblastic anemia was the most common i.e. 103 (24.92%) cases and Iron deficiency anemia was the least common i.e. 15 (3.53%) cases amongst the non-malignant hematological disorder. Other non-malignant hematological disorders in descending order of frequency were aplastic anemia 60 (14.15%) cases, idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpra ITP 40(9.43%) cases, visceral Leishmaniasis 25 (5.98%) cases , hypersplenism 11, falciparum malaria 10 (2.35%) cases and hemolytic anemia 3 (0.70%) cases. Amongst the malignant hematological disorders, acute lymphoblastic leukemia accounted for 76 (17.92%) cases and was found to be the most common disorder, followed by acute myeloid leukemia 27 (6.36%), lymphomas 5 (1.17%), chronic myeloid leukemia and neuroblastoma (0.47%) each. Conclusion: Nutritional anemias as a group was the most common hematological disorder found on bone marrow examination in our patients. Megaloblastic anemia was the most common while iron deficiency anemia was the least common in the nutritional anemia group. Acute lymphoblastic leukemia was the most common amongst the malignant hematological disorders followed by acute myeloid leukemia.

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