Bone marrow examination for detection of metastasis in patients with bronchogenic carcinoma: an evaluation of 107 patients.

As a staging procedure before treatment, examination of bone marrow from the posterior iliac crest was performed on a total of 107 patients with bronchogenic carcinoma. Among them, 11 patients (10.3%) had metastasis in the bone marrow: five of 39 adenocarcinomas, five of 33 small cell carcinomas, one of four large cell carcinomas, and none of 31 epidermoid carcinomas. Leukoerythroblastosis was found exclusively in the patients with metastasis, although the presence of tumor cells in the bone marrow did not correlate well with peripheral blood cell counts. Survival following an intensive chemotherapy in patients with bone marrow metastasis was substantially longer for those with small cell carcinoma than for those with other histologic types of bronchogenic carcinoma.