Acquired Agammaglobulinemia with Multiple Allergies and Pernicious Anemia

A number of cases of agammaglobulinemia have been reported in the medical literature since Bruton1described the first case in 1952. This condition is encountered more frequently because patients who are unable to produce antibodies against infection are surviving now with the aid of antibiotics. It is recognized more readily because a high index of suspicion of this is becoming widespread, and methods of establishing the diagnosis by the study of serum proteins are now available to most physicians. Two forms of isolated agammaglobulinemia exist: (1) a congential type. occuring as a recessive sex-linked trait in male children, with symptoms developing reduced form the normal of approximately 1,000 mg. % to less than 10 mg. %, and (2) an acquired type occurring in either sex, with symptoms developing in adulthood and serum γ-globulin levels of 20-40 mg. %. Such a distinction may be arbitrary and more apparent than real, for