What is the morphology of leukemia?

Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is a cancer of the blood and bone marrow. It causes the bone marrow to produce abnormal myeloid cells. Myeloid cells are responsible for producing blood cells, such as platelets, red blood cells, and white blood cells called myeloblasts.

What are blast cells in leukemia?

When a patient has leukemia, abnormal immature white blood cells (called blasts) multiply uncontrollably, filling up the bone marrow, and preventing production of other cells important for survival, namely red blood cells and platelets. This leads to infections, anemia and abnormal bleeding.

What is a blast cell describe its characteristics?

In general, blasts are cells that have a large nucleus, immature chromatin, a prominent nucleolus, scant cytoplasm and few or no cytoplasmic granules. Blasts may not have all of these features. Cell size – blasts are often medium to large cells.

How can you tell the difference between a blast and a lymphocyte?

However, a careful evaluation of blasts reveals several differences from reactive lymphocytes. Nucleoli are usually more visible and prominent in blasts. The cytoplasmic margins in blast cells are generally not indented and more uniform.

What do Auer rods indicate?

Auer rods are a feature of some acute myeloid leukemias, but may be seen in refractory anemia with excess blasts type 2 and rarely in CMML-2 as demonstrated here. Presence of Auer rods indicates aggressive disease with risk of transformation into acute leukemia.

What is blast percentage?

The percentage of blasts in the bone marrow or blood is particularly important. Having at least 20% blasts in the marrow or blood is generally required for a diagnosis of AML. (In normal bone marrow, the blast count is 5% or less, while the blood usually doesn’t contain any blasts.)

What is the function of blast cells?

In biology and in medicine, the suffix “-blast” refers to immature cells known as precursor cells or stem cells. Blasts give rise to all kinds of different specialized cells. For example, neuroblasts give rise to nerve cells. Blood cells come from blasts in the bone marrow.

What is a blast cell Definition?

Medical Definition of blast cell : an immature cell especially : a usually large blood cell precursor that is in the earliest stage of development in which it is recognizably committed to development along a particular cell lineage.

How do you detect leukemia?

A blood test showing an abnormal white cell count may suggest the diagnosis. To confirm the diagnosis and identify the specific type of leukemia, a needle biopsy and aspiration of bone marrow from a pelvic bone will need to be done to test for leukemic cells, DNA markers, and chromosome changes in the bone marrow.

Do blasts show up on CBC?

A CBC test can find leukemic blood cells, which are called blasts. It can also detect changes in the amount of any type of blood cell. Finding any one of these changes in the blood can suggest the presence of leukemia.

Which leukemia has Auer rods?

Auer rods are a hallmark of acute myeloid leukemia but occasionally are seen in myelodysplastic syndromes (MDSs) or chronic myelomonocytic leukemia, rarely in cases with fewer than 5% blasts. The significance of this finding is unclear. We report 9 cases of this unusual phenomenon.