CORRELATION OF KARYOTYPE WITH CLINICAL-FEATURES IN ACUTE LYMPHOBLASTIC-LEUKEMIA

  • 1 January 1982
    • journal article
    • research article
    • Vol. 42  (7) , 2918-2929
Abstract
Clinical and karyotypic features of 50 patients with acute lymphoblastic leukemia, including 33 American and 17 Japanese patients, were studied at 2 institutions. Clonal chromosome abnormalities were found in 39 of the 50 patients (78%) at diagnosis. Eleven patients had diploidy (N patients). Among the 39 aneuploid patients, 17 had pseudodiploidy (A1 patients), 8 had hyperdiploidy with 47-49 chromosomes (A2 patients), 9 had hyperdiploidy with 50-59 chromosomes (A3 patients) and 5 had other chromosome abnormalities. Of 14 patients whose chromosomes were also studied at relapse, 8 had karyotypic progression, 5 had abnormalities identical or similar to those observed at diagnosis and 1 had a change of karyotype from diploidy to aneuploidy. The median age and the median white blood cell count (WBC) of A3 patients were lower than those of any other group of patients, and all A3 patients had non-T-cell non-B-cell markers. The median age and the median WBC of A1 patients were higher than those of any other group of patients, although 1/3 of the patients had WBC < 20 .times. 103/.mu.l, and they often had leukemic cells of T-cell or B-cell lineage. The A2 patients were relatively old and tended to have higher WBC. The N patients were relatively young and tended to have low WBC, although these tendencies were not as marked as those in A3 patients. The A3 patients had longer survival times than the A1 (P = 0.003) or A2 (P = 0.002) patients. N patients had longer survival times than A1 (P = 0.03) or A2 (P = 0.05) patients. The difference in survival times between A3 and N patients was not significant. Karyotype is correlated with survival and with other recognized prognostic factors. In some A1 and A2 patients, karyotype was a more reliable factor in indicating a poor prognosis than was WBC or age.