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Introduction: The spread of Covid-19 has worsened the prognosis of oncology patients, interrupting or delaying life-saving therapies and contextually increasing the risk of severe SARS-CoV-2 infections. Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is the most frequent cancer in pediatric age and the management of this disease with concomitant SARS-COV-2 infection represents a challenging situation. Case presentation: We present the case of a 6-year-old female newly diagnosed with ALL during a documented SARS-CoV-2 infection. Our patient was admitted 20 days after SARS-CoV-2 detection for evening-rise fever. Laboratory testing showed severe neutropenia while chest x-ray detected moderate pulmonary involvement. Acute lymphoblastic leukemia diagnosis was made through morphological and molecular analysis on bone marrow aspirate. Given the stability of the blood count and clinical conditions, antiviral therapy with Remdesivir and Convalescent Plasma was started before antileukemic treatment, obtaining a rapid resolution of the infection. Conclusion: In our experience, the treatment with Remdesivir and Convalescent Plasma led to a rapid resolution of Sars-Cov-2 infection. Our case did not present any adverse event to the therapy. Thus, this treatment could be considered in patients with malignancies, in order to accelerate the resolution of the infection and begin immunosuppressive treatment safely. Further studies are required to confirm this hypothesis., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2021 Dell'Isola, Felicioni, Ferraro, Capolsini, Cerri, Gurdo, Mastrodicasa, Massei, Perruccio, Brogna, Mercuri, Pasqua, Gorello, Caniglia, Verrotti and Arcioni.)

Imerslund-Gräsbeck syndrome (IGS) is a rare autosomal recessive disorder clinically characterized by megaloblastic anemia, benign mild proteinuria, and other nonspecific symptoms. Several pathogenetic variants in the amnionless ( AMN ) or cubilin ( CUBN ) genes have been described in IGS. We describe a case of IGS with urinary tract infection and mild but persistent proteinuria at onset in an 11-month-old female child. With the appearance of macrocytic anemia, aphthous stomatitis, and neurological signs, IGS was clinically suspected, and vitamin B12 parenteral therapy was started. Sequence analysis showed the presence of a novel intronic variant c.513+5G>A of AMN , never before described in the literature, that was in compound heterozygosity with the known pathogenetic variant c.1006+34_1007-31del. Analysis extension to the parents revealed the presence of variant c.1006+34_1007-31 in the father and c.513+5G>A in the mother. In the present case with IGS, the novel intronic variant of AMN was identified in " trans " with a known pathogenic variant (c.1006-31 del) and the new variant was interpreted to be pathogenetic since it was not found in the public database of polymorphisms and because it was predicted to alter a donor splicing site. Our case underlines the relevance in detecting certain subtle symptoms, such as mild but persistent proteinuria associated with megaloblastic anemia, to reach a correct diagnosis of a rare but treatable disorder.

Background : Hypereosinophilia in children can be primary or secondary. Numerous malignant diseases can cause hypereosinophilia, but it is seldom caused by acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). In the event of protracted hypereosinophilia, it is extremely important to make a correct differential diagnosis. Case presentation : We present the case of an 11-year-old boy of Moroccan origin with ALL with hypereosinophilic onset (eosinophils in peripheral blood, 10,000/µL) in the absence of other signs of neoplastic disease, and compare this case with 61 similar cases in the literature. Following hospital admission, the patient initially presented with headache-caused nocturnal awakenings, evening fever, and cough, and he also lost approximately 7 kg in weight in a month not associated with sweating or itching. We first performed bone marrow aspiration, which showed an increase in eosinophils without cellular morphological abnormalities, and bone marrow immunophenotyping showed that 4.5% of cells had a phenotype compatible with lymphoid blasts. A lumbar puncture was negative. Given the poor marrow involvement, it was necessary to repeat a new bone marrow aspiration two days later, which showed an increase in blasts to 14%. A concomitant bone marrow biopsy showed an infiltration of blasts typical of B-cell ALL equal to 20⁻30% with associated hypereosinophilia. Cytogenetic analysis showed an hyperdiploid karyotype: 53⁻55, XY, +X, add(1)(q21q25), +4, +9, +10, +14, +2, +1, +21/46, XY. Conclusions : ALL is one of the possible causes of persistent hypereosinophilia. In patients with ALL and hypereosinophilia, peripheral hypereosinophilia can precede the appearance of blasts. Due to the negative prognosis and the increased risk of complications in these patients, bone marrow aspiration and biopsy are recommended if common causes of secondary hypereosinophilia are excluded.

Congenital or acquired severe aplastic anaemia (SAA) is cured by bone marrow transplantation (BMT) from a histocompatible leukocyte antigen- (HLA-) identical sibling. The best conditioning regimen is cyclophosphamide (CTX) with or without antithymocyte globulin (ATG), followed by short-term methotrexate (MTX) and cyclosporine A (CsA) to prevent graft-versus-host disease (GvHD). In our pediatric oncology-hematology unit, a 5-year-old girl with SAA was treated with two BMT from the same HLA-identical sibling donor. Severe CsA-induced adverse events (severe hypertension and PRES) after the first BMT led necessarily to CSA withdrawal. Alternative immunosuppressive treatment for GvHD prevention as tacrolimus and mycophenolate were not tolerated by our patient because toxicity > grade II. For this reason we decided to administrate sirolimus alone as GvHD prophylaxis and to prevent disease relapse after the rescue BMT. Here we report the successful use of sirolimus alone for GvHD prophylaxis after the second transplant in a pediatric BMT setting for SAA.

Human herpesvirus-6 (HHV-6), like all the other herpes viruses, remains latent in host cells after primary infection but can be reactivated in immunocompromised patients causing fever, skin rash, bone marrow (BM) suppression, pneumonitis, sinusitis and meningoencephalitis. We describe the case of a man with chronic myelogenous leukemia who developed encephalitis associated with acute graft-versus-host disease two months after a T-cell-depleted mismatched peripheral blood stem cell transplant. Magnetic resonance images of the brain revealed multiple bilateral foci of signal abnormality. HHV-6 was the only pathogen detected in cerebrospinal fluid by PCR. Treatment with both ganciclovir and foscarnet was unsuccessful and the patient gradually deteriorated and died. Other cases of HHV-6 encephalitis after bone marrow transplantation are reviewed.