Aplastic Anemia - Causes / Risks

Causes / Risks

Aplastic anemia causes include radiation, chemotherapy, certain medications or it may occur due to autoimmune diseases.

Aplastic anemia (AA) develops when damage occurs to the bone marrow thereby slowing or shutting down the production of new cells. The bone marrow produces stem cells which are transformed into red blood cells (RBCs), white blood cells (WBCs) and the platelets. All these cells have a definite life time- RBCs live for 120 days, WBCs for about a day and platelets about a week after which they have to be replenished by the body.

When the ability of the bone marrow to produce more cells severely weakens or dies, then enough bone marrow cells or blood cells are not produced leading to aplastic anemia.

Some factors that temporarily or permanently impair the bone marrow include:

• High-dose radiation & chemotherapy used to treat cancer can also kill healthy cells besides killing cancer cells. This can temporarily cause AA(2^✔ ✔Trusted Source
  Effective treatment of aplastic anemia secondary to chemoradiotherapy using cyclosporine A.
  
  Go to source).
• Exposure to toxic chemicals. Exposure to toxic chemicals, such as those used in pesticides and insecticides, may result in the occurrence of aplastic anemia. Benzene is a toxic chemical implicated in AA formation.

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• Use of certain drugs/medications such as chloramphenicol, phenylbutazone or medications containing gold, used in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis, can cause AA.
• Autoimmune disorders, such as lupus, can compromise the BM greatly causing AA.
• Viral infection affecting the bone marrow especially those caused by the HBV, Epstein-Barr, cytomegalovirus, parvovirus B-19 or HIV, can cause AA.
• Pregnancy can cause an auto immune type of AA.(3^✔ ✔Trusted Source
  Management of aplastic anemia in a woman during pregnancy: a case report.
  
  Go to source)
• Unknown factors. In about 50% of cases AA is idiopathic.