3.1 Baseline characteristics of 20 PNH patients
Twenty patients with refractory/recurrent or glucocorticoid dependent
classic PNH were enrolled in our study. The results of bone marrow
cytology in 20 patients with PNH showed that 9 patients (9/20, 45.00%)
had increased bone marrow viability, 11 patients (11/20, 55.00%) had
obvious activity, and no decreased proliferation was found. There were
12 males and 8 females with ages ranging from 19-68 years, and the
median age was 41 years. The course of disease from diagnosis to
chemotherapy ranged from 0.08 to 16 years. All patients had been treated
with corticosteroids before, but
the clinical efficacy of corticosteroids was not as expected. Some
patients had complications such as diabetes, hypertension, and gastric
mucosal bleeding, which may be related to long-term corticosteroid use
and high-dose corticosteroids. Some of the patients were also treated
with androgens, erythropoietin and cyclosporine before chemotherapy.
None of the patients had thrombotic complications or had received
prophylactic anticoagulant therapy. The dose and cycle number of
chemotherapy drugs were adjusted according to the severity of
myelosuppression or hemolysis. The baseline characteristics of the
patients are summarized in Table 1.
The clinical symptoms of the 20 PNH patients were summarized as follows:
17 (85.00%) cases of dizziness and fatigue, 11 (55.00%) cases of
palpitation and shortness of breath, 3 (15.00%) cases of tinnitus, 18
(90.00%) cases of pale skin mucosa, 15 (75.00%) cases of yellow skin
mucosa , and 16 (80.00%) cases of darkened urine (including 7 cases of
soy sauce colored urine, 6 cases of strong tea colored urine, and 3
cases of dark yellow urine).