Malignant diseases of hematopoietic and lymphoid tissues in Chernobyl clean-up workers.

Introduction: The question as to whether the incidence of leukemias and malignant lymphomas among the clean-up workers increased in 18 years after the catastrophe is still a point of much controversy. Precise diagnosis of the main forms of hematopoietic malignancies and comparison of these data with those in the general population will be helpful in estimating thr relative contribution of the radiation factor to the overall incidence of such pathologies.

Materials And Methods: In all, 187 consecutive cases of malignant diseases of hematopoietic and lymphoid tissues in Chernobyl clean-up workers were analyzed in Ukrainian Reference Laboratory in 1996-2003.