CLL leukemia

[Bobby13]

What does it mean when your white blood count increases from 27 to 30.6 10^9/L

4.0-10.0 10^9/L

[AussieNeil Partner Administrator]

Hi Bobby and welcome to our community. I see that you have just joined us.

It's honestly impossible to answer your question without further information,. That's because your White Blood Cell (WBC) count is made up of 5 different white blood cell types; or 6 if you include immature and mature neutrophils: healthunlocked.com/cllsuppo...

As explained in that pinned post, with CLL, we should track our lymphocyte count, not our WBC,, bearing in mind that even that number is the total of healthy B, helper and cytotoxic T, plus natural killer lymphocytes, along with CLL lymphocytes. While most of the white blood cells in that count of around 30 will be CLL cells, the increase could be the result of an improvement in other important white blood cell numbers which fight infections. You need to look at the differential part of your blood test results to see what white blood cell types have changed. If absolute counts aren't provided, you can calculate them with the percentages that should be provided. Simply multiple the percentage by the WBC count. So for example, if you have 20% neutrophils, your neutrophil count is around 6.

With such a small change in your WBC, your CLL is probably fairly stable. It's important to look for trends, keeping in mind that there are inherent accuracy limits associated with testing healthunlocked.com/cllsuppo...

Finally, with respect to whether you might be approaching the need for treatment, the relevant trigger is the lymphocyte count doubling in under 6 months when the count is above 30. We have members still in watch and wait with lymphocyte counts in the many hundreds.

Neil

[Agfar]

Neil has done a great job with his reply. To give you an idea of my progression, I have known about my CLL for 15 or 16 years and have needed no treatment. I've had similar white cell counts and lymphocytes for the past five years. No-one will be the same of course but a rise of 3 in your numbers could even be a margin of error in the counting. I kept a graph at the start but I don't anymore due to my stability. If you do keep a graph then have the extent of the lymphocyte axis set to at least 100 or maybe 200. My lymphocytes are around 180 currently. Like the stock market, numbers can go down as well as up.