[Rheumatoid arthritis and chronic granular T-cell lymphocytosis with neutropenia. A clinical condition distinct from Felty's syndrome].

: 103 cases of rheumatoid arthritis who had been diagnosed between 1984 and 1985 have retrospectively been analyzed, in order to identify those patients who had presented with associated neutropenia and in whom it was thus possible to suggest a presumptive diagnosis of either Felty's syndrome or chronic granulated lymphocytosis with neutropenia. Four patients (3.8%) satisfied the clinical criteria for the latter diagnosis while only one had typical Felty's syndrome. They were again studied using blood counts, microscopy of bone marrow and surface antigen analysis of mononuclear cells and the above mentioned diagnoses were confirmed. Though clinically indistinguishable, these two conditions are clearly distinct on both hematologic and immunological grounds. The four patients with rheumatoid arthritis and chronic granulated T cell lymphocytosis with neutropenia represent 36.3 per cent of our institution's patients with chronic granulated T cell lymphocytosis of undetermined significance. Caution should be used in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis of the patients with associated granular lymphocyte proliferation, considering the possible adverse effects that drugs such as gold salts, penicillamine, cyclosporine and methotrexate may exert not only on the immunological system but also on granulocytopoiesis.