[Several clinical-x-ray manifestations of myeloma disease in Bulgaria]

Two hundred patients with myeloma disease have been reported in Bulgarian medical literature for the period 1943-1973. The males are 62.3 per cent and the females--37.7 per cent. Out of all the cases 91.2 per cent are at the age of 40 and 48 per cent of the patients--between 51--60. The following incidence rate of the investigated syndromes and symptoms was established: osseous--96 per cent, asthenic-dynamic--93.2 per cent, consumptive--74,6 per cent, neurologic--57.4 per cent, febrility--53 per cent, hepatomegalia--50 per cent, splenomegaly--24.3 per cent, lymphoadenomegalia--23.5, per cent, hemorrhagic--37.1 per cent, skin manifestations--20.7 per cent, spontaneous fractures--42.7 per cent, osseous tumors--25 per cent, hypercalcemia--56.1 per cent, broachitis and bronchopneumonia--50.7 per cent of the patients. The distribution according to the X-ray criteria reveals: osteolytic form--81,4 per cent; diffuse-porotic--9.3 per cent and osteonegative--9.3 per cent. The diagnosis was made within 1 1/2 years after the appearance of the first manifestations. The average life span is about 2 years (2 1/2 months to 5 1/2 years). A difference in the prognosis of beta1-,beta2- and gamma-myelomas was no testablished.