THLASSEMIA & HIGH WHITE CELL COUNT!

I had a spleen splenectomy when I was 8 years old so I could do the butyrate trail out in Boston, MA. Unfortunately it didn't work for me. For as long as I can remember since I had my spleen remove my white cell count is always been high at 15, Which is not bad at all, but Lately, since September to current, My WBC count has been 21.something up to 26.something. I find this a bit weird since the lab has not addressed this issues since they have been marking it as "P" instead of "H" for high. I would imagine anything marked "P" is problematic.

Any reason to why my WBC is this high?

Ariadne,

This is "normal" post a splenectomy - this is due to:

1. The spleen acts as a filter and removes the deformed, dying and dead cells (RBCs/WBCs) from the body - in the absence of a spleen, these cells get to "circulate" around the body longer, before they just "dissolve". As a result, you will always get a high WBC count.  Your platelet counts should also be high or at the high end of the range.

2. Machine tests read the blood counts improperly - typically, when your blood is analysed by the machine, it uses a math program to distinguish between the cells, which is determined by size of the cells among others - I don't know if your lab in the US will do this, but ask them for a "Hand Count" to correct for the absence of the spleen. The way this is done is by smearing a blood drop on a slide, and manually counting under an electron microscope. I have had this "hand count" correction done a few times, just to check when my counts spiked. I count 20-25K as "normal" for me!

If the hand count still shows a high count, or if a hand count is not possible, you would need to get a few tests done for chronic infections. That could be the other cause.

Cheers

Poirot