General information about Leukemia
Leukemia or Leukemia - is a group of tumors, which is characterized by uncontrolled proliferation and varying degrees of differentiation of hematopoietic cells. Leukemic cells at the same time are the descendants of one mutated cell clones.

The cause of leukemia, as a rule, are chromosomal aberrations, ie changes in the structure of chromosomes as a result of various restructuring processes of their structure: translocations, deletions, inversion, fragmentation.

In accordance with the traditional classification, all divided into acute leukemia (AL) and chronic (CL). This division is associated with different ability data for differentiation of proliferating tumor cells. In the case of acute leukemia differentiation was virtually absent in the blood builds up a lot of immature, nonfunctional blast cells, resulting in inhibition of normal hematopoiesis of all germs. These features are identified in the blood of more than 80% of cases. Chronic leukemia (leukemia) gives the population of differentiated cells, usually granulocyte gradually replace normal cells in peripheral blood.

Acute leukemia divided into Lymphoblastic and myeloblastic.
  • Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) usually develops from a precursor B-lymphocytes (about 75% of cases). There are also B-ALL and T-ALL. Cytogenetic counts the presence of Philadelphia chromosome.
  • Acute myeloblastic leukemia (acute myeloid leukemia) is often called "nelimfoblastny leukemia", to emphasize its diversity and unlike ALL, because blasts at the same time can have granulocyte, erythrocyte, and even platelet origin. Acute leukemia nelimfoblastny histologically classified by the letter M with the numbers from 0 to 7, for example, M7 - it megakarioblastnaya acute leukemia.

Chronic leukemia in children are rare and are also a diverse group of diseases:

  • Chronic lymphocytic leukemia characterized by proliferation of small lymphocytes in the bone marrow, peripheral blood and lymph nodes, spleen and liver.
  • Chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML) is characterized by proliferation of stem cells, which is often accompanied not only by the increase in the number of granulocyte precursors, but also of erythrocytes and platelets. Distinctive feature is a cytogenetic feature - the presence of Philadelphia chromosome, as well as the phase character of the disease. There are the slow phase, the acceleration and final phase of the disease.
  • Hairy-cell leukemia is characterized by proliferation of well-differentiated B-lymphocytes with development of pancytopenia and splenomegaly. The disease is characterized for the elderly and more frequently in males.
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