The myelodysplastic syndromes: analysis of prognostic factors and comparison of prognostic systems in 128 Chinese patients from a single institution.
BACKGROUND
Although retrospective analysis were frequently undertaken, and many prognostic systems for myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) have been proposed worldwide, few such studies have been performed and the effectiveness of different scoring systems have not yet been verified in independent patient populations in China. The aim of this single center study was to evaluate the prognostic factors and compare the prognostic scoring systems in Chinese patients with MDS.


METHODS
One hundred and twenty-eight patients diagnosed as primary MDS in our Institution were studied retrospectively to identify significant prognostic factors and to assess the predictive value of 11 previously described prognostic systems, including French-American-British (FAB) classification, World Health Organization (WHO) classification, Mufti, Sanz, Morra, Aul, Oguma, Toyama, Morel and international prognostic scoring system (IPSS).


RESULTS
The median age of the patients was 50 years (range 13-82). The 2- and 5-year survival rate of the patients were 55.22+/-4.90% and 26.09+/-6.36% respectively, with a median survival of 31 months (range 1-127 months). Fifty patients (39.1%) had progressed to acute leukemia (AL) with a median time of 8 months (range 1-43 months). Major independent variables indicated by multivariate analysis were the percentage of bone marrow (BM) blast cells and complex karyotype aberrations for survival (P=0.042 and 0.042, respectively) and only the percentage of BM blast cells for AL transformation (P=0.023). All the systems except Mufti scores successfully discriminated risk groups concerning both survival and AL evolution, especially in the high risk group, ranging from 10 to 20 months and from 4 to 7 months, respectively. The FAB and WHO classification, as well as Sanz, Oguma, Morel and IPSS possessed lower P value (P<0.0001) than that of the rest scoring systems.


CONCLUSIONS
The patients in our study were younger than these of the Western population, whereas the survival and AL transformation ratio were comparable to these previous studies. The BM blast proportion and complex chromosomal defects were highly significant for predicting outcome in MDS patients. Most investigated systems effectively stratified patients into groups with different life expectancies and identified a subset of patients with poor clinical outcome. The FAB, WHO classification, as well as Sanz, Oguma, Morel and IPSS scoring systems were more applicable for predicting survival and leukemia progression.
Department of Hematology, State Key Laboratory for Medical Genome Research, Shanghai Institute of Hematology, Shanghai Rui Jin Hospital, Shanghai Second Medical University, 197 Rui Jin Er Road, Shanghai 200025, China.
Wei-Li
WL
Zhao
Lan
L
Xu
Wen
W
Wu
Hua
H
Yan
Wei
W
Tang
Jiong
J
Hu
Yu
Y
Chen
Jun-Ming
JM
Li
Xiao Ying
XY
Zeng
Shu-Min
SM
Xiong
Zhi-Xiang
ZX
Shen
Zhu
Z
Chen
Zhen-Yi
ZY
Wang
Sai-Juan
SJ
Chen
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D001752:Blast Crisis; D002471:Cell Transformation, Neoplastic; D002681:China; D002869:Chromosome Aberrations; D020732:Cytogenetic Analysis; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009190:Myelodysplastic Syndromes / Q000145:classification / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000401:mortality; D011379:Prognosis; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D016019:Survival Analysis; D015996:Survival Rate