부산대학교 도서관

Background and purpose: Prognostic factors in B-cell chronic lymphocytic leukemia (B-CLL) which include detection of chromosomal aberrations and expression of CD38 have improved the prognosis of physician's management of the disease in the western world. The present study evaluated the use of these two new parameters in Taiwanese patients with B-CLL. Methods: Bone marrow and peripheral blood cells from 13 B-CLL patients were examined by fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) to detect genomic aberrations and investigated for the expression of CD38 by flow cytometry. Results: All 13 cases could be evaluated by FISH in which 12 patients exhibited abnormalities. The most frequent abnormalities were deletions involving the 11q chromosome band. 17p deletion was observed in one patient (patient 2) with advanced disease who died during the study. One patient had CD38 expression of over 30% (42.6% in patient 4). The patient suffered from a progressing disease. Conclusions: Chromosomal aberrations and CD38 expression are important independent predictors of disease progression of B-CLL in the western world. Here, we found that these two parameters may also provide valuable adjuncts to the present staging systems for predicting the clinical course in Taiwanese B-CLL cases.