Transient Pure Red-Cell Aplasia: Cell-Mediated Suppression of Erythropoiesis Associated with Hepatitis

doi:10.1059/0003-4819-92-2-196

Transient Pure Red-Cell Aplasia: Cell-Mediated Suppression of Erythropoiesis Associated with Hepatitis

Cleveland, Ohio

Abstract

Transient pure red-cell aplasia is a rare complication of persistent acute hepatitis. We have investigated possible mechanisms for marrow suppression in one such patient who developed erythroid aplasia in the course of transfusion-related hepatitis. The patient's lymphocytes, obtained during the acute illness, markedly inhibited erythroid colony formation by donor marrow. After the patient recovered, remission lymphocytes in co-culture did not inhibit colony formation. No reversible suppression was demonstrable by addition of patient serum. These observations suggest that hematocytopenias associated with hepatitis may result from cell-mediated suppression induced by hepatic injury.

Article and Author Information

▸From the Departments of Medicine and Pediatrics, Case Western Reserve School of Medicine, University Hospitals of Cleveland; Cleveland, Ohio.
Grant support: in part by a grant from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, National Institutes of Health, U. S. Public Health Service (HL07147-02).
Dr. Wilson is currently in the Department of Medicine, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and Dr. Tebbi is in the Department of Pediatrics, Roswell Park Memorial Institute, Buffalo, New York.
▸Requests for reprints should be addressed to Harvey J. Dworken, M.D.; Department of Medicine, University Hospitals of Cleveland; Cleveland, OH 44106.
- Received October 4, 1979.
- Accepted November 21, 1979.