Praveen Malayath1
BACKGROUND
Myelodysplastic syndromes are clonal marrow stem cell disorders characterised by ineffective haemopoiesis leading to blood cytopenias. Various prognostic parameters have been used to assess the prognosis of the disease like age, gender, IPSS score, modified IPSS score, serum albumin, Red Cell Distribution Width (RDW), serum ferritin and Lactate Dehydrogenase (LDH).
MATERIALS AND METHODS
The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship of serum lactate dehydrogenase at presentation of patients and the consequent development of complications and death that occurred in the followup period.
RESULTS
For this purpose, we studied 117 consecutive confirmed cases of myelodysplastic syndrome that presented to the Department of Medicine and Haematology in Calicut Government Medical College between July 2009 and June 2013. Serum lactate dehydrogenase levels were taken on diagnosis. All patients were followed up till December 2014. All subsequently developing complications- both outpatient and inpatient along with deaths that occurred were studied.
CONCLUSION
Although, a majority of patients with myelodysplastic syndrome (66.7%) had an LDH levels less than 500 IU/L, the undifferentiated subtype, RAEB-2 subtype and RAEB-1 subtype had a statistically significant high LDH levels probably due to high cell turnover rate. There was a positive correlation between LDH values and the complication rate of patients. A statistically significant correlation was seen between high LDH value and the frequency of death that occurred in the study group.
KEYWORDS
Myelodysplastic Syndrome, Lactate Dehydrogenase.
