blood disorders
Heavy Chain Diseases
Introduction
Heavy chain diseases are plasma cell cancers in which a clone of plasma cells produces a large quantity of pieces of abnormal antibodies called heavy chains. (See also Overview of Plasma Cell Disorders .) Plasma cells develop from B cells ( B cells ), a type of white blood cell that normally produces If a single B cells multiplies excessively, the resulting group of genetically identical cells (called a clone) produces a large quantity of a single type of There are 5 classes of antibodies— IgM, IgG, IgA, IgE, and IgD. Each class has its own type of heavy chain. The main heavy chain diseases are categorized according to the type of heavy chain produced: Alpha (from IgA) Gamma (from IgG) Mu (from IgM) 