7th International AIDS Conference Florence, Italy — June 16-21, 1991

Int Conf AIDS 1991 Jun 16-21; 7:102 (abstract no. M.A.1041)
Kaczmarski RS, Sutherland S, McManus T, Moxham J, Moran S, Mufti GJ; King's College Hospital School of Medicine and Dentistry, London, England

OBJECTIVES: The pathogenesis of peripheral blood cytopenias in HIV infection is likely to be multifactorial. Proposed mechanisms include direct infection of haemopoietic cells or progenitors, stromal dysregulation of haemopoiesis, immune-mediated destruction and the myelosuppressive effects of drugs. Bone marrow abnormalities reminiscent of myelodysplastic syndromes suggest the haemopoietic stem cell may be the target of HIV infection; however, there is conflicting evidence to support this.

METHODS: To study haemopoiesis in HIV infection we performed in vitro culture of marrow from seropositive patients; marrow was cultured directly on methylcellulose and agar for CFU-Mix, BFU-E and CFU-GM, and long-term liquid cultures.

RESULTS: We have studied three HIV patients with peripheral blood cytopenia and three seronegative controls. Preliminary results from direct BM culture show no difference in in vitro colony growth of CFU-Mix, BFU-E or CFU-GM in patients and controls. There are no differences in the appearance of the stroma, haemopoietic foci or fat cells in long-term culture, and CFU-GM from cells harvested from LTC are the same.

CONCLUSIONS: We are performing in situ hybridization and PCR on harvested colonies and stromal layers to determine whether we can detect genomic integration of HIV in these cells, however these preliminary results suggest that in HIV, ineffective haemopoiesis may be due to some inhibitory factors which are absent in in vitro culture systems. We are conducting studies to investigate this possibility.

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