Benign hematogone-rich lymphoid proliferations can be distinguished from B-lineage acute lymphoblastic leukemia by integration of morphology, immunophenotype, adhesion molecule expression, and architectural features

Distinction of normal B-lymphoid proliferations including precursors known as hematogones from acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is critical for disease management. We present a multiparameter assessment of 27 bone marrow samples containing at least 25% hematogones (range, 25%-72%) by morphologic review. We used flow cytometry to evaluate B-cell differentiation antigen and adhesion molecule expression and immunohistochemistry on clot sections to evaluate architectural distribution. Flow cytometry revealed that intermediately differentiated cells (CD19+, CD10+) predominated, followed in frequency by CD20+, surface immunoglobulin-positive cells, with CD34+, terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase (TdT)-positive cells as the smallest subset. Adhesion molecules (CD44, CD54) were expressed more heterogeneously compared with expression in acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Immunohistochemistry revealed that CD34+, TdT-positive cells were dispersed without significant clustering, while CD20+ cells exceeded CD34/TdT-positive cells in 24 of 25 cases. This multidisciplinary study demonstrates that hematogone-rich lymphoid proliferations exhibit a spectrum of B-lymphoid differentiation antigen expression with predominance of intermediate and mature B-lineage cells, heterogeneity of adhesion molecule expression, and nonclustered bone marrow architectural distribution.