[Bone-marrow biopsy in chronic myeloid leukemia. Significance during development]

In 29 patients bone marrow biopsy carried out during the course of chronic myeloid luekemia, permitted the authors to divide up the patients into 5 histologically different groups according to the association of 3 parameters: the richness in granulocytes, the state of the matrix, the degree of leukoblastosis. There was, in most cases, correspondence between the histological appearance and the clinical and laboratory symptoms. This was particularly clear when the patient entered the terminal phase of the disease. 4 of the 5 histological groups had an unfavourable short-term prognosis, i.e., granulocyte hyperplasia with myelofibrosis, aplasia with normal matrix or with myelofibrosis and massive leukoblast invasion.