Clinical Features of Chronic Myeloid Leukaemia

Since all chronic leukaemias evolve slowly with time, the patient may not have any symptoms at all. But some may have some of the following symptoms.

·         Symptoms of anaemia – easy fatigability, low exercise tolerance are features of anaemia.

·         Abdominal discomfort – Chronic Myeloid leukaemic patients can develop massive enlargement of the spleen. This leads to abdominal discomfort due to its heavy weight.

·         Weight loss – weight loss is a feature of any chronic illness.

·         Fever and sweating – as I describes in my initial posts there is a high metabolic processes going on in leukaemic tissues. This high metabolic activity creates a lot of energy which is released as heat. As a result the patient begins to have fever and sweating.

·         Headache – this is mainly due to hyperleukocytosis.

·         Symptoms of thrombocytopenia -these symptoms include bleeding, bruising and priapism.

Other than above mentions symptoms of chronic leukaemia, the following signs can also be found if examines carefully.

·         Pallor – look carefully under the lower eyelid, if it is pale in colour then you have developed anaemia. But, don’t jump in to the conclusion that you have leukaemia just because you are pale. Pallor can also be a feature of thousands of other diseases.

·         Palpate the abdomen starting from the right lower part of the abdomen and then gradually palpate lightly towards the left upper part of the abdomen. If you something firm in this path, it is the enlarged spleen.

·         Lymphadenopathy – this is enlarged lymph nodes in the body.

·         There will be retinal haemorrhages, but it needs a special equipment to visualize retinal haemorrhages.    

References : Kumar P and Clark M, 2009. Clinical Medicine. 7th ed.