Splenic Disorders & Leukemia Lymphoma Cases Flashcards
What is Red pulp?
- Sinusoids network filled wit hblood that filters abnormal RBC and platelets out
What is white pulp?
- Marginal zone:
- area where macrophages responsible for clearing out debris and encapsulated organisms are found
- PALS: T cells
- Primary follicle: B cells antibody production
Why is splenomegaly a problem?
- Rupture in acute splenomegarly
- Staging of hematologic malignancies
- Portal hypertension
- Cytopenias in certain cases (leads to hypersplenism)
Splenomegaly vs Hypersplenism
Splenomegaly:
- enlarged spleen, can be an active or passive process
Hypersplenism:
- Pathologic condition where blood cells are removed by the spleen leading to anemia, leukopenia, or thrombocytopenia on a CBC
Examples of hypersplenism?
- Sickle Cell Anemia:
- Life threatening condition caused by pooling of blood in the spleen
- HS:
- splenic sequestration and luysis due to cellular shape and can worsen anemia
- Idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura:
- Acquired autoantibodies against platelets
- Cases refractory to pharmaceutical therapy or cases with life threatening thrombocytopenia benefit from splenectomy
What is Castell’s point?
Palpate at the anterior axillary line under ribcage and have patient breathe in, if they have splenomegaly you will feel the spleen
- If pretest suspicion is high you can use PE
- If pretest suspicion is low use imaging
Common causes of splenic rupture?
- Trauma is most common
- Splenomegarly due to mono, CLL or HCL
- Also caused by surgical trauma
What is Kehr’s sign
- Irritation of phrenic bnerve by sub diaphragmatic bleeding
- Left shoulder pain
- Elicited in recumbent position with legs raised
When can a patient with mono return to non contact sports? contact sports?
- non: 3 weeks from onset of sx
- contact: 4 weeks from onset of sx
What is OPSI?
- Overwhelming post splenectomy infection
- Occurs bc spleen is removed and can’t fight encapsulated organisms anymore
- no spleen=no reticularendothelial system
- Starts vague illness progressing to sepsis in 2-3 days
- Highest risk is 3 yrs after splenectomy
What vaccines do patients who had a splenectomy need?
- S. pneumoniae
- N. meningitidis
- H. influenzae B
66 yo man with fatigue and fever complaining of weakness and bruising. He has petichiae on feet and arms and conjunctival pallor.
- Hgb: 7.6
- Hct: 22
- WBC: 18.6
- Plt: 60
Peripheral smear shows 25% blasts, they are large cells with large nuclei and visible nucleoli. The patient previously had MDS. What are you now suspecting? How does this explain his symptoms?
AML arising from MDS
- Pallor from anemia
- Petechiae and brusing from low platelets
- Fever from non functional WBC’s
What tx do you do for neutropenic fever?
- Empiric antibiotics
- Empiric abx are targeted at gram nexative organisms first (psuedomonas)
- Cefepime, piperacillin-tazobactam, meropenem, ceftazidine
- Fungal coverage added after 48n hrs if fever persists
What should you do if your patient has a neutropenic fever after prior abx tx during induction chemo, but cultures come up negative for bacteria?
- Silver stain for fungus from the central line
- Treat with amphotericin B/voriconazole and replace the line
- Treat with GM-CSF to get the neutrophil count back up
What are the three stages of chemotherapy?
- Induction: initial chemo to induce a remission
- Consolidation: intensifying chemo to make sure no cancer cells survived
- Maintenance: for some cancers long term therapy is needed to maintain remission and prevent relapse