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Simultaneous occurrence of bcr-abl and inv16 in a case of M1 acute myeloid leukemia

Leukemia volume 15, page 695 (2001)Cite this article

Prognosis of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) depends on different factors like age, performance status, tumor mass, but especially on cytogenetic characteristics of the blasts.1 Inv 16 is supposed to be a favorable prognostic factor,2 and the majority of patients carrying this chromosome abnormality can be cured with conventional chemotherapy, especially when high dose Ara-C is used. The presence of the Philadelphia chromosome in AML is very rare3 and it characterizes a group of patients with an unfavorable prognosis.4 The simultaneous occurrence of numeric and structural aberrations in a leukemic blast is a common finding. To our knowledge we describe here the first case of AML carrying a CBFbeta-MYH11 transcript together with a bcr-abl transcript in the leukemic blast of an AML M1 case.

A 40-year-old female patient was admitted at a local hospital because of intermittent abdominal pain. She reported a slight weight decrease of 6 kg during the last 6 months and increasing fatigue and asthenia in the last 10 days. Physical examination was unremarkable. Routine laboratory findings showed an unexpected elevated white blood cell count (80 000/μl) with 85% of blasts. Hemoglobin level was 12 g/dl and the platelet count was 60 000/μl.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Haematology, Regional Hospital Bozen, Bozen, Italy

    M Svaldi, A Lanthaler, P Coser & M Mitterer

  2. Laboratory of Cytogenetics, Regional Hospital Bozen, Bozen, Italy

    R Venturi

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  1. M Svaldi
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  2. A Lanthaler
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  3. R Venturi
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  4. P Coser
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  5. M Mitterer
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Svaldi, M., Lanthaler, A., Venturi, R. et al. Simultaneous occurrence of bcr-abl and inv16 in a case of M1 acute myeloid leukemia. Leukemia 15, 695 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.leu.2402082

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