Acute respiratory distress syndrome in an adult patient with a myelodysplastic disorder.

A 58-year-old man was diagnosed to have refractory anaemia with excessive blasts. After 3 1/2 years of relative control on periodic blood transfusions, the patient developed an acute leukaemia. Although the blastic crisis was not extreme (WBC counts less than 100 X 10(9)/l), a severe, intractable respiratory distress syndrome set in and brought the patient to the exitus in a few days. Overt signs of septic shock were absent, as was evidence of any other known cause of adult respiratory distress. Acute pulmonary failure can be the cause of death in leukaemic patients even in the absence of overwhelming sepsis or hyperleucocytosis.