[The effect of recombinant human erythropoietin on erythrocyte lines in patients with anemia and chronic renal insufficiency]

Abstract

Blood counts, bone marrow cytology and iron status in 13 patients with severe renal anemia assessed prior to and after recombinant human erythropoietin treatment. The mean increase of PCV after 8 weeks of treatment was 50%. Simultaneously, we observed a fourfold increase of the reticulocyte count. This increment correlated with a twofold increase of the percentage of bone marrow erythroblasts. We also observed an increment of the relative number of erythropoietin-dependent early erythroblasts. The tager PCV of 0.30 was achieved in 4 of 5 predialysis patients, but was not achieved in 8 hemodialysis patients because they had an "absolute" bone marrow erythroblastopenia. In conclusion, conventional hematologic examination revealed that application of recombinant human erythropoietin leads to improvement of erythrocytopoiesis in different stages of chronic renal failure.