Pediatric White Blood Cell Disorders

Pathophysiology

Body produces white blood cells (leukocytes), which help fight bacterial infections, viruses and fungi. If your child has too few or too many white blood cells, in general, here's what it means: Low white blood cell count (leukopenia) means having too few leukocytes circulating in the blood. A long-term low white blood cell count increases the risk of infections and may be caused by a number of different diseases and conditions.

Disease statistics

There were 157 cases during 20 years; 140 (89%) occurred after a diarrheal prodrome. The mean annual incidence was 1.42/100 000 children (range 0.2 to 3.4/100 000 children/year). Periods of high incidence occurred; however, there was no overall sustained increase in incidence. Escherichia coli O157:H7 was isolated from the stool of 62% of children who had specimens submitted.

Treatment

Treatments for white blood cell disorders depend on several factors, including: The type of disorder, The extent of the disorder, Your child’s overall health, Your child’s response to treatment, Your preferences Our treatments for your child’s white blood cell disorder may include: Chemotherapy, Radiation, Antibiotics, Colony-stimulating factors (these increase the body’s production of blood cells), Drugs to suppress the immune system Stem cell transplantation may be useful for some types of severe white blood cell disorders, particularly those caused by bone marrow problems

Research

The implications of the detection of residual disease after treatment of acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) are unclear. We conducted a prospective study at 11 centers to determine the predictive value of the presence or absence of detectable residual disease at several points in time during the first six months after complete remission of childhood ALL had been induced. Junctional sequences of T-cell–receptor or immunoglobulin gene rearrangements were used as clonal markers of leukemic cells. Residual disease was quantitated with a competitive polymerase-chain-reaction (PCR) assay.