Bone Marrow Failure: A Child Is Not Just a Small Adult (But an Adult Can Have a Childhood Disease) Click on the link to access the full-text article. The article says this about SDS:
Patients with Shwachman-Diamond syndrome (SDS, OMIM 260400) usually present in early childhood with malabsorption due to pancreatic insufficiency, and neutropenia.25 However, a substantial proportion go on to develop aplastic anemia, MDS, or leukemia.1 These complications may occur in SDS patients who have reached adult age, and thus may have outgrown the care of a pediatric hematologist.
SDS is an autosomal recessive disorder, in which the majority of the tested patients have been found to have mutations in the Shwachman Bodian Diamond syndrome gene (SBDS) located at 7q11.26 Pancreatic insufficiency can be confirmed by demonstration of low serum trypsinogen in young children, although this may improve with age and be normal in adults with SDS. More specific is a low serum isoamylase, which increases in normal children until age 3 but remains low in older children and adults with SDS.27 The diagnosis of neutropenia requires documentation at least 3 times, but may improve with age. About half of the reported SDS patients had metaphyseal dysostosis, and short stature unrelated to malabsorption is a common component of the syndrome. Approximately 40% of the reported patients with SDS developed additional cytopenias, including aplastic anemia, at up to 35 years of age. SDS patients with neutropenia may respond to G-CSF, while pancytopenia may require androgens and consideration of SCT. Unfortunately, the survival after SCT is around 50%, unrelated to whether the donor is a matched sibling or an alternative donor.1 Deaths were related to complications of MDS or leukemia, as well as to cardiotoxicity from cyclophosphamide.
Availability of mutation testing in the SBDS gene may now facilitate consideration of SDS in adult patients with neutropenia or aplastic anemia who were not diagnosed in childhood, but may have a family history or personal history of symptoms consistent with this diagnosis.
For information on Shwachman-Diamond Syndrome check out Shwachman-Diamond America
