Drug-Induced Autoimmune Red-Cell Aplasia

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Abstract
Whether judged by its therapeutic or economic impact, recombinant human erythropoietin (epoetin) is an extremely successful application of molecular genetic technology to the development of a therapeutic agent. Epoetin is remarkably effective in the treatment of patients with a deficiency of the hormone, especially those with uremia, in whom renal production of erythropoietin is markedly impaired. Because erythropoietin receptors occur predominantly on erythroid progenitor cells, epoetin has a high degree of specificity and no clinically significant effects on nonhematopoietic cells. Thus, its ratio of efficacy to toxicity, or therapeutic index, is matched by few, if any, other pharmacologic agents.Until . . .