Pancytopenia

Defintion: A pancytopenia is when the white blood cells are
low, the red blood cells are low and the thrombocytes are
low.  This is a serious problem because one is anemic
(low red blood cells), and one does not have the ability
to have their blood clot (thrombocytopenia) and one
cannot defend themselves against attacks by bacteria,
fungus or virus (low white blood cells).

Therapy: The first project is to determine the cause.
This is usually done by a bone marrow sample.  A bone
marrow sample is obtained by taking a large bore
trochar, and inserting it into the ilium (pelvis bone)
in order to get a piece of the bone and the blood making
cells which are in the bone.  Then one looks at the
pieces of bone and the cells within the bone to find
out why the blood cells are not being produced.

This is a serious problem and one needs to discover the
cause as soon as possible.

After the bone marrow is obtained, then the therapy of
giving whole blood and platelets is started.