Computer-assisted severity of effect assessment of hematopoietic cell renewal after radiation exposure based on mathematical models.

After accidental radiation exposure, one of the most significant health impairments is the partial or complete failure of the blood forming systems. Depending on the degree of damage, a suitable therapy must be prepared in time. This requires the assessment of the degree of damage of the blood-forming system and, in particular, of the stem-cell pool. A new approach for assessing the degree of hematopoietic impairment based on dynamic reactions of blood counts immediately following radiation exposure is presented. Cell kinetic mathematical models of blood cell turnover, neural networks, and expert-assessed clinical data records of historical radiation accidents are combined to provide a method for automatic classification of patients and to assign them to clinically related categories of severity. Using this computer-assisted approach, it is possible to distinguish those patients that are likely to restore their blood-cell formation autochthonously from those that need stem-cell transplantation.