What is the treatment for cyclical neutropenia?
Neutropenia is the reduction of the number of the circulating neutrophil white blood cells. The importance of this is that neutrophils are the main blood cells used to kill and ingest bacteria. There are several causes of neutropenia. These include viral illness, certain severe bacterial infections such as typhoid, drugs that affect the production of blood, certain megaloblastic anaemias, vitamin B12 and folate deficiencies and a form of rheumatoid arthritis called Felty’s syndrome. There are racial and rarely genetic causes. Cyclical neutropenial, as it suggests, is an undulating level of neutrophils over a period of two to three months and is thought to be genetic. Diagnosis will require serial blood tests to identify a pattern of changing neutrophil levels. If the diagnosis is proved every effort will be made to exclude other causes of reduced neutrophil production. Prophylactic antibiotics are used as additional protection when levels are low.
