New diagnostic tool for systemic mastocytosis

PubMed, the Internet portal of biomedical and life sciences literature, indexed an interesting article, entitled “Tryptase detection in bone-marrow blood: a new diagnostic tool in systemic mastocytosis.” (J Am Acad Dermatol. 2007 Mar;56(3):453-7). Authors are Proelss J, Wenzel J, Ko Y, et al., from the Department of Dermatology, University of Bonn, Bonn, Germany. The condition mastocytosis includes a heterogenous group of disorders that are characterized by abnormal growth and accumulation of mast cells. The diagnosis of systemic mastocytosis is substantially based on the histologic examination of bone-marrow biopsy specimens. With the present study, the authors establish a new diagnostic tool for systemic mastocytosis. Unfortunately, they can only present a limited number of cases, since systemic mastocytosis is a rare disease involving few patients. Their results indicate that the measurement of tryptase in bone-marrow blood is a new, sensitive marker of the mast cell burden in bone marrow of patients with systemic mastocytosis. To access the full abstract of the article, click here.