Epidural anesthesia in pregnant patients with low platelet counts.

A number of patients demonstrate thrombocytopenia in the peripartum period. One hundred four patients with unexplained transient periparturient thrombocytopenia were found over a nine-month period. Sixty-one of them received epidural anesthesia without neurologic sequelae.

Unexplained periparturient thrombocytopenia.

Since the advent of routine automated platelet counting we have observed unexplained periparturient thrombocytopenia (PPT) in an unexpected number of periparturient women, ie, during labor or within 24 hr postpartum. Mean +/- SD platelet count in 686 random blood donors was 236 +/- 50 X 10(9)/L and 1.02% had a platelet count less than 136 X 10(9)/L; in 2,204 random prenatal and postpartum women mean count was significantly higher (275 +/- 86 X 10(9)/L; p less than 0.

Autoimmune hemolytic anemia with concurrence of warm and cold red cell autoantibodies and a warm hemolysin.

This report describes the laboratory findings and clinical course of a patient with thrombophlebitis, venous gangrene, and autoimmune hemolytic anemia. Three concomitant red cell autoantibody activities were detected: a low-titer, high-thermal-amplitude, IgM anti-I cold agglutinin; an IgG warm 'incomplete' panagglutinating autoantibody; and an IgM warm hemolysin.

Bacteriocin and flow cytometry in laboratory diagnosis of leukemic peripheral blood lymphocytes and bone marrow cells.

The bacteriocin, colicin HSC10, produced by Escherichia coli HSC10, was studied as a laboratory tool for detection and differentiation of leukemic from normal lymphocytes in human peripheral blood. Flow cytometry studies detected DNA loss in bacteriocin-affected cells by computerized histograms. Differential analysis is given for the peripheral blood of 26 individuals using bacteriocin, cytochemistry and surface markers.

Variants of an interspecies hybridoma with altered tumorigenicity and protective ability against mouse myeloma tumors.

Recent isolates of RX54-3 hybridoma cells (new cells) protect BALB/c mice against subsequent challenge with the tumorigenic myeloma parent cells used to construct this hybridoma. In contrast, hybridoma cells which have been maintained in tissue culture for long periods of time (old cells) are not protective. In the present study, we compared a number of properties of the new and old hybridoma cells and determined which line was more similar to the parent myeloma.