Acute Lymphocytic Leukemia

lab findings

physical findings

cellular changes: immature lymphoblasts
(Litzow, 2014)

pathophysiology/etiology

immature B lymphoblast

immature T lymphoblast

blood clotting function

CT of lymph nodes

spinal fluid analysis

bone marrow aspiration

CBC

low RBC (Litzow, 2014)

low normal WBC (Litzow, 2014)

low platelet levels (Litzow, 2014)

20% of cells in bone marrow are lymphoblasts- definitive diagnostic test for ALL (Seiter, 2017).

stain slides with myeloperoxidase (MPO) and terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase (TdT) to determine if leukemia is myeloid or lymphoblastic. If it is lymphoblastic, then the TdT stain will be positive (Seiter, 2017).

enlarged lymph nodes/spleen (Litzow, 2014).

immature, malignant B and T lymphoblasts form
(Litzow, 2014).

immature lymphoblasts crowd bone marrow (Litzow, 2014)

normal cells don't have space, can't form in bone marrow
(Litzow, 2014)

decreased cell numbers of RBC, WBC, platelets (Litzow, 2014).

anemic (Litzow, 2014)

shortness of breath (Litzow, 2014)

low hemoglobin level (Litzow, 2014).

prone to bleeding (Litzow, 2014)

infection prone (Litzow, 2014)

enlarged spleen/lymph node due to lack of normal lymphocytes (Litzow, 2014).