Improvement of anemia by recombinant human erythropoietin in paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria

: A 32-year-old man visited Kanto Teishin Hospital complaining of general fatigue in May, 1992. He had been diagnosed as having paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria since 1980, because of brownish urine in the morning. He received blood transfusion in 1980. In 1983, he was treated with medication. There was no remarkable improvement, however, and he stopped coming to the hospital. When he was admitted to our hospital, hemolytic anemia and hemosiderinuria were noticed. Sucrose hemolysis test and acidified-serum lysis test (Ham test) were both positive. Positive rates of decay accelerating factor and CD59 were 38.8% (control 100%) and 45.4% (control 100%), respectively. His diagnosis was thus confirmed. Bone marrow was slightly hypocellular, and erythroid cells were relatively hyperplastic (M/E ratio 0.68). The oral administration of iron and oxymetholone was not effective for anemia. He was treated with daily subcutaneous administration of recombinant human erythropoietin (EPO, 3,000U/body/day). His hemoglobin level increased from 7.5g/dl to 12.0g/dl in 4 weeks, and general fatigue disappeared. Since he had concurrent chronic hepatitis C, alpha-interferon was also administered and his hemoglobin level is now controlled between 10 and 11g/dl. This case suggests that EPO can be useful for treating hemolytic anemia, even though erythroid cells in the bone marrow are hyperplastic.