The Philadelphia chromosome is present in more than 95% of chronic myeloid leukemia patients and 13% of acute lymphocytic leukemia patients. The Philadelphia translocation, t(9;22), fuses the BCR and ABL genes resulting in the expression of leukemia-specific, chimeric BCR-ABL messenger RNAs. To facilitate diagnosis of these leukemias, we have developed a method of amplifying and detecting only ...

Abbreviations: acute lymphoblastic leukemias, (ALLs); acute myeloid leukemia, (AML); arsenic trioxide, (ATO); B-cell chronic lymphocytic leukemia, (B-CLL); blast crisis, (BC); chronic lymphocytic leukemias, (CLL); CML-Acceleration Phase/Blast Crisis, (CML/AP/BC); CML-Bone Marrow Transplantation patients, (CML-BMT); CML-Chronic Phase patients, (CML/CP); DNA binding domain, (DBD); dominant-negati...

The authors describe a 51-year-old man with chronic lymphocytic leukemia who presented with respiratory distress and then died suddenly while in hospital. Autopsy revealed pulmonary leukostasis and a large intracardiac mass containing mostly mature lymphocytes and fibrin. Although leukostasis and lymphocyte thrombi have been described (albeit rarely) in chronic lymphocytic leukemia, an intracar...

Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) is the most common adult leukemia in the Western world. Host immune surveillance caused mainly by the disease itself is speculated to be responsible for high incidence of secondary neoplasms. However, the simultaneous occurrence of CLL and myeloproliferative disorder in the same patient is extremely rare. In the present report, a case of an 81-year-old man who...

Conventional therapies for chronic lymphocytic leukemia are not likely to provide a cure, prompting the use of more aggressive approaches. High-dose therapy with autologous and allogeneic bone marrow or blood stem cell transplantation appear to induce a prolonged period of disease-free survival in selected patients with this indolent disease. Significant questions were raised, however, in terms...

Chronic lymphocytic leukemia is characterized by clonal proliferation and progressive accumulation of B-cell lymphocytes that typically express CD19+, CD5+ and CD23+. The lymphocytes usually infiltrate the bone marrow, peripheral blood, lymph nodes, and spleen. The diagnosis is established by immunophenotyping circulating B-lymphocytes, and prognosis is defined by two staging systems (Rai and B...

The rapid progress in next-generation sequencing technologies has significantly contributed to our knowledge of the genetic events associated with the development, progression and treatment resistance of chronic lymphocytic leukemia patients. Together with the discovery of new driver mutations, next-generation sequencing has revealed an immense degree of both intra- and inter-tumor heterogeneit...

Skin metastasis of primary gallbladder tumors is extremely rare with a reported incidence of 0.7~9% and it usually involves the thorax, abdomen, the extremities, neck, head region, and scalp. Cutaneous metastasis may occur synchronously or metatochronously. In the present case, the patient had chronic lymphocytic leukemia, which was being treated with an alkylating agent (chlorambucil) when the...

1. Zenz T, Krober A, Scherer K, et al. Monoallelic TP53 inactivation is associated with poor prognosis in chronic lymphocytic leukemia: results from a detailed genetic characterization with long-term follow-up. Blood. 2008;112(8): 3322-3329. 2. Malcikova J, Smardova J, Rocnova L, et al. Monoallelic and biallelic inactivation of TP53 gene in chronic lymphocytic leukemia: selection, impact on sur...

Chemotherapy combinations with monoclonal antibodies are now the basis for treatment of chronic lymphocytic leukemia. Rituximab, the most widely used anti-CD20 antibody in routine clinical practice, led not only to improvement of progression-free survival, but also to improvement of overall survival in previously untreated patients with good performance status in combination with fludarabine an...