Morphological Pattern of Childhood Lymphoblastic Leukaemia Shaikh Zayed Hospital, Lahore (1994-1999)

Abstract

This study was conducted at Haematology Department of Shaikh Zayed Hospital, Lahore. During the period of six years (1994-1999), 76 cases of acute lymboblastic leukaemia (ALL) were diagnosed in children upto 15 years of age (age range 0.6-15 years). These cases included 53 males (697%) and 23 females (30.3%) with a male/female ratio of 2.3:1. Amongst the ALL cases Li was the most frequent subtype accounting for 48 patients (63.2%), followed by L2, 26 patients (34.2%) and L3, 2 patients (2.6%). ALL cases showed a distinct peak in the children upto 5 years of age and a decline thereafter in older age groups. ALL-Li mainly contributed for this early age peak. LI showed a clear predominance in younger age groups whereas L2 cases showed a progressively increasing relative frequency in older age groups.