Leukaemia means cancer of the blood. It’s a problem with how white blood cell are made. They don’t grow properly and don’t do their job of defending your body against germs!

As well as not growing properly, these white blood cells also grow very quickly in your bone marrow, then they spill out and crowd your bloodstream. Soon there isn’t enough room for your other blood cells to grow, so then they don’t work properly either. This causes all kinds of problems, like neutropenia, anaemia and thrombocytopenia. Or you could have all of these things together - this is called pancytopenia.

There are several different types of leukaemia. Some are acute and some are chronic, and some affect adults more than kids. The different types are:

Acute myeloid leukaemia (AML)
Acute lymphocytic leukaemia (ALL)
Chronic myeloid leukaemia (CML)
Chronic lymphocytic leukaemia (CLL)
Hairy cell leukaemia (HCL)

                                                                                                                   
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