title: Minimal residual disease status in transplanted chronic myelogenous leukemia patients: low incidence of polymerase chain reaction positive cases among 48 long disease-free subjects who received unmanipulated allogeneic bone marrow transplants.
abstract: Forty-eight long-term disease-free chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML) patients, who had received unmanipulated allogeneic bone marrow transplants (BMT) for eradication of the Philadelphia (Ph1)-positive clone were studied by polymerase chain reaction (PCR), using a very sensitive PCR procedure and very stringent criteria for preventing and revealing contamination. Nine patients (18%) were positive at the first PCR examination, but only one patient remained PCR positive four years after. However, a second PCR analysis performed on new bone marrow samples obtained at a median interval of 14 months (range 6-16) after the first specimen collection from six of nine originally positive cases, and from 16 of 39 originally negative cases, showed that only one of the six positive cases remained positive, whereas negativity was confirmed in all the originally negative patients. These data are evidence that the Ph1-positive clone is apparently completely eradicated in the majority of CML patients who survive disease-free long-term after an unmanipulated allogeneic BMT and that only sporadic cases remain PCR-positive four years post-BMT. The data also show that at least two sequential bone marrow samples for each patient must be analyzed before drawing conclusions regarding the stable persistence of BCR/ABL transcripts and the minimal residual disease status.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biomedical Science and Human Oncology, University of Turin, Italy.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Guerrasio
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Martinelli
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Saglio
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Rosso
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Zaccaria
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Rosti
authors.forename: N
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Testoni
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Ambrosetti
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Izzi
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Sessarego
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001483:Base Sequence; D016465:Bone Marrow Purging; D016026:Bone Marrow Transplantation; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D016044:Fusion Proteins, bcr-abl / Q000235:genetics; D006801:Humans; D015464:Leukemia, Myelogenous, Chronic, BCR-ABL Positive / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000235:genetics / Q000601:surgery*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010677:Philadelphia Chromosome; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction; D012333:RNA, Messenger / Q000032:analysis; D012334:RNA, Neoplasm / Q000032:analysis; D012074:Remission Induction; D014184:Transplantation, Homologous
chemical_list: D012333:RNA, Messenger; D012334:RNA, Neoplasm; D016044:Fusion Proteins, bcr-abl