So ended the editorial entitled “Some Speculations on the Myeloproliferative Syndomes” published in Blood in 1951 by the journal editor, William Dameshek. He speculated that these various conditions, which he had termed “myeloproliferative,” were all somewhat variable manifestations of proliferative activity of the bone marrow cells, perhaps due to “a hitherto undiscovered stimulus.” More than half a century later, Dameshek would probably have been pleased to learn that much has been learned about the cellular defects that cause these various disorders and that the term he coined has survived more or less intact
