[Comparison of the sensitivity of various mouse hematopoietic stem cells to cis-diamminodichloroplatinum (II)].

Recently, several investigators have reported on severe myelosuppression, particularly anaemia, in patients treated repeatedly with cis-diamminedichloroplatinum (II) (cisplatin). The aim of the present study was to evaluate the sensitivity of different haematopoietic stem cells to this agent in mice. Survival of CFU-S, CFU-C and BFU-E was determined 24 h after i.p. injection of increasing doses of the drug. All three stem cell types showed exponential survival curves without evidence of plateau phases indicating that the effect of cisplatin has no cell cycle dependency. In addition, BFU-E appeared to be significantly more sensitive to cisplatin than CFU-S and CFU-C. Doses required to reduce the stem cell compartment sizes to 37% were found to be 3.0, 4.9 and 5.4 mg/kg of cisplatin, respectively. In view of these data, the question arises whether the preferential toxicity of cisplatin for BFU-E is causatively involved in the development of anaemia induced by this agent.