DELETION OF THE LONG ARM OF CHROMOSOME-7 IN MYELOMONOCYTIC LEUKEMIA WITH BONE-MARROW EOSINOPHILIA

We report a 62-year-old man with acute myelomonocytic leukemia with bo ne marrow eosinophilia (M4Eo), and a deletion of the long arm of chrom osome 7. The patient presented with pancytopenia, which shortly after evolved to overt leukemia. There was no response to the daunorubicin-c ytosine arabinoside (Ara-C) regimen, and a remission achieved with ams acrine (AMSA)-Ara-C lasted only for a short time. On relapse, a peculi ar skin rash accompanied the hematologic picture. While ANLL with chro mosome 7 abnormalities usually carries adverse prognosis, patients wit h M4Eo (which is usually associated with chromosome 16 abnormalities) do better. The patient described here examplifies that M4Eo may be ass ociated with del(7)(q22), and that it is the chromosomal abnormality r ather than the type of leukemia that might determine the clinical outc ome. (C) Elsevier Science Inc., 1997.