Open AccessRatio of baseline erythropoietin (EPO) level and corrected reticulocyte count as an indicator for a favourable response to recombinant human erythropoietin (rhEPO) therapy in anaemic cancer patients
Author(s) -
Charuruks Navapun,
Voravud Narin,
Limpanasithikul Wacharee
Publication year - 2001
Publication title -
journal of clinical laboratory analysis
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.536
H-Index - 50
eISSN - 1098-2825
pISSN - 0887-8013
DOI - 10.1002/jcla.1038
Subject(s) - erythropoietin , medicine , reticulocyte , anemia , malignancy , gastroenterology , cancer , clinical significance , complete blood count , oncology , biochemistry , chemistry , messenger rna , gene
Purpose: Recently, recombinant human erythropoietin (rhEPO) was introduced for the management of anemia in malignancy. To identify an indicator for a favourable response to rhEPO, 28 anaemic cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy and treated with rhEPO were evaluated. Methods: Patients were classified into responder (16 of 28, 57%) and nonresponder (12 of 28, 43%) groups according to their responses to rhEPO therapy (response being defined as an increase in Hb level of >2 g/dl from baseline without blood transfusion). Results: Treatment with rhEPO showed significant improvements in the red blood cell (RBC) count, haemoglobin (Hb), packed cell volume (PCV), and reticulocyte count (ret. count) after 4 weeks. Upon analysing the baseline value of the EPO level and the corrected ret.count in these two groups, we found that the ratio of the EPO level and the corrected ret.count (EPO/ret.count) demonstrated a statistical significance ( P = 0.03) in the prediction of response to rhEPO therapy. This ratio showed a sensitivity of 87.5%, specificity of 66.7%, and overall accuracy of 78.6%. Conclusion: Our study suggested that the baseline ratio of EPO/ret.count should be used as an indicator for a favourable response to rhEPO therapy. J. Clin. Lab. Anal. 15:260–266, 2001. © 2001 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.