Acute myelofibrosis with peripheral myeloblastosis: an acute myeloproliferative disorder

Acute myelofibrosis is an uncommon fulminant disorder characterized by pancytopenia, premature myeloid elements in the peripheral blood, and bone marrow fibrosis. We report the case of a 59-year-old man who had acute myelofibrosis and peripheral myeloblastosis clinically suggesting the diagnosis of acute granulocytic leukemia. The disease was unresponsive to cytotoxic drugs or androgens and the patient died five months later. The association of bone marrow fibrosis with large numbers of myeloblasts in the peripheral blood has rarely been reported and suggests a spectrum of morphological changes in acute myeloproliferative disorders, analogous to the merging of chronic myeloproliferative disorders into one another and into leukemic blast crisis.