Peripheral blood cells in the study of chromosome aberrations of patients with chronic myeloid leukaemia or myelofibrosis.

Chromosome studies were performed on peripheral blood (PB) cells with and without stimulation, and/or on bone marrow (BM) cells from 21 patients with chronic myeloid leukaemia (CML), and 18 patients with myelofibrosis (MF). Our results show that almost all the patients with immature granulocyte precursors in PB also had mitotic cells in their unstimulated PB. In CML all unstimulated mitoses had the Philadelphia chromosome. In each patient the abnormal karyotype in the PB was the same as in the BM. Because of the high frequency of dry taps in myelofibrosis, the tissue of choice for chromosome study is peripheral blood.