Decreased blood flow to rat bone marrow, bone, spleen, and liver in acute leukemia

An acute promyelocytic leukemia in the rat (BNML) has been used in model studies on pathogenesis and therapy of human acute myeloid leukemia. The blood supply to bone marrow during BNML development has hitherto not been examined, even though in general, blood flow to hematopoietic tissues might affect drug treatment and marrow transplantation regimes. We measured the perfusion of various organs during the course of the disease in untreated rats and in rats given one injection of cyclophosphamide treatment. Organ perfusion was measured with radioactive microspheres. Blood flow per gram tissue to the bone marrow, bone, spleen, and liver declined gradually during the leukemic progression, thus paralleling the growth of leukemic deposits. Cyclophosphamide treatment retarded, but did not reverse, the decreasing perfusion of these tissues.