29/07/2025
We've had a good week of interesting cases and fun cytology!
This is a bone marrow samples being taken from a patients humerus.
The bone marrow is aspirated and mixed with the anticoagulant CPDA-1 in a sterile kidney dish.
The spicules in the sample (the cellular looking areas) are then drawn into a capillary tube and smeared onto microscope slides 🔬
On cytology, we could see what looks like lots of plasma cells!
This is a suspected multiple myeloma case.
Multiple myeloma is a neoplasia of the plasma cells (WBC). Plasma cells produce immunoglobulins.
These patients can present with increased globulins, which causes hyperviscosity.
Hyperviscosity can cause a multitude of issues, hypertension, occular haemorrhage, epistaxis, cerebrovascular disease, ischaemia, coagulation issues, lethargy, end organ damage, seizures etc.
It can also associated with hypercalcaemia of malignancy.
These cases are not very common and can present in many ways, due to the variation of clinical signs.
Cool case!
