Clinical Significance of Platelet Parameters in the differential diagnosis of thrombocytopenia

INTRODUCTION: Bone Marrow (BM) examination is the gold-standard test in discriminating between hyperdestructive thrombocytopenia and hypoproductive thrombocytopenia. However, BM examination is an invasive, time-consuming, and expensive approach. Therefore, BM study is not recommended as the first-line method. Recent studies showed that platelet parameters such as mean platelet volume (MPV), plateletcrit (PCT), platelet size deviation width (PDW) could be used for differential diagnosis of thrombocytopenia. In the present study, accordingly, we aimed to investigate the significance of these parameters in the differential diagnosis of thrombocytopenia. METHODS: One hundred sixty-four (164) patients with thrombocytopenia were included in the present study. The patients were divided into two groups according to the time of the diagnosis of thrombocytopenia: hyperdestructive (75 ITP) and hypoproductive (25 AA, 25 MDS, 24 AML, 15 ALL). The diagnosis was made based on hematological, pathological, and chromosomal analyses and guidelines. Samples for complete blood counts were collected in K3EDTA tubes and analyzed with an automated hematology analyzer, Beckman-Coulter. RESULTS: The platelet count was similar in both groups. The present results showed that there were no statistically significant differences between the groups in terms of age, gender and PDW. However, MPV was significantly higher in the hyperdestructive group than the hypoproductive group. By contrast, PCT was considerably lower in the hyperdestructive group than the hypoproductive group. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION: The results of the present study indicated that these platelet parameters might provide additional contributions to strengthen the diagnosis in patients diagnosed with ITP and would be beneficial to consider the thrombocyte parameters as well as the clinical and other laboratory tests of the patient.