All issues > Volume 36(7); 1993

Case Report

J Korean Pediatr Soc. 1993;36(7):1009-1015. Published online July 15, 1993.

A Case of Cyclic Neutropenia

Yoon Hwa YH Cha¹, Hye Sun HS Lee¹, Young Min YM Ahn¹, Myoung Sook MS Koo²

¹Department of Pediatrics, Kangnam General Hspital, Seoul, Korea
²Department of Clinical Pathology, Kangnam General Hspital, Seoul, Korea

Abstract

Cyclic Neutropenia is a benign, unusual hematologic disorder characterized by regularly recurring episodes of severe neutropenia occurring approximately every 21 days. Beside neutrophils, monocytes, lymphocytes, platelets and reticulocytes all cycle with strict periodicity suggest that this disease should be viewed as cyclic hematopoiesis, not merely as cyclic neutropenia. During neutropenic periods, patients regularly experience aphthous stomatitis, fever, malaise, cervical lymphadenitis, cutaneous infections and occasional pneumonia and otitis media. The exact cause of cyclic neutropenia is unknown. But it is strongly suggested that cyclic neutropenia is due to an abnormality in the regulation of early hematopoietic precursor cells. We have documented a case of cyclic neutropenia for a period of 2.5 years in a 11 year-old boy who had suffered from recurrent fever, stomatitis, gingival swelling, cervical lymphadenitis and skin infections at 3 weeks intervals since 5 years of age. A brief review of the related literatures is presented.

Keywords :Cyclic neutropenia