| pubmed-article:3459349 | pubmed:abstractText | The handmirror shape is a cell configuration assumed by mononuclear leucocytes and leucocyte precursors during locomotion. A fraction of fixed tumour cells in bone-marrow smears from patients with acute leukaemia have this handmirror shape. The incidence of handmirror cells has been reported to correlate positively with length of patient survival in some previous studies, but not in others. This controversy was elucidated by examination of bone-marrow smears of a retrospective material, consisting of smears from 32 patients with acute myelocytic leukaemia of the M1 and M2 type from 1971-1974. During this period, cytostatic treatment of acute myelocytic leukaemia was so weak that it can be considered almost negligible for the patient group studied. There was a positive but statistically non-significant correlation between incidence of handmirror cells and length of patient survival (Rs = +0.28, p = 0.11). It is reasonable to assume that incidence of handmirror cells is a minor prognostic sign, the effect of which is not detectable in all materials. | lld:pubmed |
