[Clinical studies of the erythrocytosis produced by a new hemoglobin with oxygen affinity : Hb Hôtel-Dieu alpha 2A beta 2 Asp replaced by Gly (author's transl)].

A new case of erythrocytosis associated with a high oxygen affinity hemoglobin is reported : the substitution of beta 99 of aspartic acid by glycine, characterized this abnormal hemoglobin, named "hemoglobin Hôtel-Dieu". An important associated smoking habit, probably responsible of an abnormal lung X-ray and of a disturbed CO transport, contributed to increase the difficulty of diagnosis. Familial inquiry, the search of an abnormal hemoglobin by standard or isoelectrofocusing electrophoresis, and the 2,3-DPG assay should be systematically performed in case of polycythemia in young people or in the absence of obvious aetiology. A corpuscular abnormality can be thus detected in about 10 p. cent of such polycythemias.