Bone-Marrow Failure Due to Relative Nutritional Deficiency in Cooley's Hemolytic Anemia

Abstract

SINCE the observations of Lyngar¹ and Owren² on the mechanism of intercurrent anemic crises in hereditary spherocytosis, it has been widely recognized that bone-marrow failure often underlies such crises and may complicate the course of various other chronic hemolytic disorders.^{3 4 5 6 7} Such "aplastic crises" are usually self-limited, frequently lasting ten to fourteen days, and are accompanied by an apparent arrest of early erythroid precursors (stem cells), resulting in erythroid marrow hypoplasia and reticulocytopenia. This acute inhibition of stem-cell proliferation is usually caused by infection, thus accounting for the familial nature of anemic crises in some patients afflicted with hereditary hemolytic disorders. . . .