GENOTYPIC CHARACTERIZATION AND MULTIVARIATE SURVIVAL ANALYSIS OF CHRONIC LYMPHOCYTIC-LEUKEMIA IN TAIWAN

In Taiwan, as in other areas of Asia, the incidence of chronic lymphoc ytic leukemia (CLL) is low. A retrospective analysis was conducted to elucidate the clinicopathologic features of CLL patients in Taiwan. Of the 47 cases of CLL enrolled in this study, 45 were immunophenotyped as B-CLL; the other 2 were T-CLL. It was found that the lower the Bine t and Rai stages of the B-CLL, the longer patients survive (p = 0.0131 and 0.0142, respectively). Univariate analysis showed that fatigue, s plenomegaly, hepatomegaly and anemia are associated with poor survival with p values of 0.0203, 0.0184, 0.0001 and 0.0171, respectively. By multivariate analysis with Cox's proportional hazard model, hepatomega ly and decrease in body weight were the two most significant predictor s of survival. However, molecular parameters of kappa or lambda immuno globulin (Ig) gene rearrangement or double allele rearrangement of Tg gene did not significantly increase the predictability of the prognosi s.