Important: This page is general information, not medical advice. It does not recommend or prescribe any treatment. Always consult your doctor or pharmacist before starting, stopping or changing any medicine.
About Bone Marrow Diseases
Bone marrow is the spongy tissue inside some of your bones, such as your hip and thigh bones. It contains stem cells. The stem cells can develop into the red blood cells that carry oxygen through your body, the white blood cells that fight infections, and the platelets that help with blood clotting.
With bone marrow disease, there are problems with the stem cells or how they develop:
- In leukemia, a cancer of the blood, the bone marrow makes abnormal white blood cells
- In aplastic anemia, the bone marrow doesn't make red blood cells
- In myeloproliferative disorders, the bone marrow makes too many white blood cells
- Other diseases, such as lymphoma, can spread into the bone marrow and affect the production of blood cells
Causes of bone marrow diseases include genetics and environmental factors. Tests for bone marrow diseases include blood and bone marrow tests. Treatments depend on the disorder and how severe it is. They might involve medicines, blood transfusions or a bone marrow transplant.
It sits within Immune System.
The lead U.S. institute for this subject is the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute.
When to speak to someone. Reading about a topic cannot tell you whether it applies to you. Speak to a doctor or pharmacist if symptoms are severe, sudden, getting worse, or simply not going away — and seek emergency care immediately for chest pain, breathing difficulty, sudden weakness or confusion, or a serious allergic reaction.
Research on Bone Marrow Diseases
5,735 studies areregistered for this condition on ClinicalTrials.gov, the U.S. National Library of Medicine's public registry. A selection is below — the links go straight to the registry entry, not to a summary of ours.
What a registered study does and does not mean. Registration means a study exists and has been declared publicly. It says nothing about whether the treatment being tested works, is safe, or is available to you. Many studies find no benefit — that is what research is for. Never seek out an experimental treatment on the strength of a registry entry alone.
Research currently under way
- Imatinib Mesylate or Dasatinib in Treating Patients With Previously Untreated Chronic Phase Chronic Myelogenous LeukemiaNational Cancer Institute (NCI)
- Mismatched Related Donor Versus Matched Unrelated Donor Stem Cell Transplantation for Children, Adolescents, and Young Adults With Acute Leukemia or Myelodysplastic SyndromeChildren's Oncology Group
- Naxitamab for High-Risk Neuroblastoma Patients With Primary Refractory Disease or Incomplete Response to Salvage Treatment in Bone and/or Bone MarrowY-mAbs Therapeutics
- Study of Factors Regulating Mast Cell ProliferationNational Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID)
- Autologous T Cells Transduced With Retroviral Vectors Expressing TCRs for Participant-specific Neoantigens in Patients With Hematologic MalignanciesNational Cancer Institute (NCI)
- A Study of Tebapivat (AG-946) in Participants With Anemia Due to Lower-Risk Myelodysplastic Syndromes (LR-MDS)Agios Pharmaceuticals, Inc.
Research already completed
- Cause of Unexplained AnaphylaxisNational Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID)
Study data from ClinicalTrials.gov, a service of the U.S. National Library of Medicine. Retrieved 2026-07-30. Registry entries are supplied by study sponsors and investigators; ClinicalTrials.gov does not verify their scientific validity. PocketsInfo is not affiliated with, and not endorsed by, the NLM or the NIH.
Where to read more
Rather than paraphrase, we point you to the primary sources. Every link below is to a government health agency, a national institute or a recognised medical body — grouped by what you are trying to find out.
Diagnosis and Tests
- Blood Count Tests: MedlinePlus Health TopicNational Library of Medicine
- Blood TestsNational Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute
- Bone Marrow TestsNational Library of Medicine
- Reticulocyte CountNational Library of Medicine
Treatments and Therapies
- Bone Marrow Transplantation: MedlinePlus Health TopicNational Library of Medicine
- Drugs Approved for Myeloproliferative Neoplasms or Myelodysplastic SyndromesNational Cancer Institute
- Treatment Option Overview (Chronic Myeloproliferative Neoplasms)National Cancer Institute
- Treatment Option Overview (Myelodysplastic/Myeloproliferative Neoplasms)National Cancer Institute
Genetics
- 8p11 myeloproliferative syndrome: MedlinePlus GeneticsNational Library of Medicine
- Ataxia-pancytopenia syndrome: MedlinePlus GeneticsNational Library of Medicine
- Diamond-Blackfan anemia: MedlinePlus GeneticsNational Library of Medicine
- Essential thrombocythemia: MedlinePlus GeneticsNational Library of Medicine
- Fanconi anemia: MedlinePlus GeneticsNational Library of Medicine
- Paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria: MedlinePlus GeneticsNational Library of Medicine
- Pearson marrow-pancreas syndrome: MedlinePlus GeneticsNational Library of Medicine
- Polycythemia vera: MedlinePlus GeneticsNational Library of Medicine
- Primary myelofibrosis: MedlinePlus GeneticsNational Library of Medicine
- Shwachman-Diamond syndrome: MedlinePlus GeneticsNational Library of Medicine
Clinical Trials
- ClinicalTrials.gov: Bone Marrow DiseasesNational Institutes of Health
- ClinicalTrials.gov: Myeloproliferative DisordersNational Institutes of Health
Medical subject headings
Clinicians and researchers index this subject under Bone Marrow Diseases. These are the terms to use when searching medical literature.
This page is built from the MedlinePlus health topic record for Bone Marrow Diseases, a service of the U.S. National Library of Medicine (NLM), National Institutes of Health. Information is from MedlinePlus.gov. PocketsInfo is not affiliated with, and is not endorsed by, the NLM or the NIH. Retrieved 30 July 2026.