Hematogones are normal immature cells from bone marrow that are responsible for the production of the immune system's B cell lineage. Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) of precursor B cells represents one type of neoplastic transformation of hematogones. Due to their high similarity, there are risks of erroneous interpretation making the use of complementary diagnostic techniques necessary. CD10 and CD19 antigens are expressed on both types of cells so, the use of other monoclonal antibodies is necessary to identify their malignant or benign nature. In an attempt to avoid the use of different antibodies, we investigated possible differences in the expressions of CD10 and CD19 in both cell types. We collected 36 samples of bone marrow from non-neoplastic patients as a control group. The ages of the patients ranged from 0 to 15 years with an average of 5 years. Also 39 samples from patients with ALL of B cells were collected. The ages of these individuals ranged from 0 to 14 years with an average of 6.6 years. We analyzed the differences between the fluorescence in respect to average intensity, standard deviation, variation, inclination and kurtosis coefficients for the two markers. The individual values of each sample were compared with the intervals generated by the values of the control group: mean ± 2SD; mean ± SD and mean ± 3SD. It was possible to distinguish the groups with 89.7% and 75%; 79.5% and 100% and 71.8% e 100% of sensitivity and specificity, respectively for the three intervals. In conclusion, the expression of CD10 and CD19 antigens on blasts and hematogones are significantly different and may be useful in the differentiation of the two cell types.
Hematogones; flow cytometry; acute lymphoblastic; leukemia
