Diagnostic Assessment of Bone Marrow Aspiration Smears, Touch Imprints and Trephine Biopsy in Haematological Disorders.

ABSTRACT

Diagnostic Assessment of bone marrow aspirate particle smears, imprints and biopsy sections was done on 40 haematological disorders. Core needle biopsy of the bone marrow is a safe and useful procedure. It is a valuable diagnostic aid for measurement of marrow cellularity and fibrosis.Bilateral trephine biopsy was conducted wherever necessary.Bone marrow aspiration was the most effective method for studying morphological details and was able to diagnose most of the cases except the 2 cases of myelofibrosis which yielded dry tap for which trephine biopsy was diagnostic.Trephine biopsy was also found to be superior for staging of lymphomas and to study the ALIP in MDS.Touch imprints were useful for studying cell morphology, where aspiration yielded dry tap.All the three procedures of bone marrow aspiration, trephine biopsy and touch imprints were found to be complementary to each other and superiority of one method over the other depended on the specific disease process.