International Journal of Cell Cloning, Vol 4, 82-90, Copyright © 1986 by AlphaMed Press
Lack of correlation between in vitro corticosteroid effect on hemopoietic colony formation and response to corticosteroid therapy in aplastic anemia
Y Yoshida, H Sakota, Y Taniguchi, S Ohmori, T Kamamoto, T Ohkubo, M Yamagishi and H Uchino
We performed hemopoietic colony culture assays in 15 patients with aplastic
anemia (AA) in order to test the effect of hydrocortisone (HC) on late
erythroid colony (CFU-e) formation of the patients' marrow and to correlate
the in vitro culture results with the clinical response to corticosteroid
therapy. HC enhanced CFU-e growth in four patients. All four patients
failed to respond to corticosteroid, but three improved with with
androgens. The addition of HC did not increase CFU-e colony formation in 11
patients. However, two of them responded to corticosteroid therapy. Among
the nine patients showing no HC effect in vitro, two subsequently improved
with androgens and one each with anti- thymocyte globulin and
anti-lymphocyte globulin. The results suggest that the in vitro
corticosteroid effect may not necessarily correlate with responsiveness to
corticosteroid therapy.
