Clinicopathological Variables and Outcome in Chronic Phase Chronic Myeloid Leukemia Associated with BCR-ABL1 Transcript Type and Body Weight

Background: It has been reported that general adiposity in adulthood and early adulthood, and greater height may increase the risk of almost all types of lympho-haematopoietic cancers while a study done in MD Anderson found that obesity and adult weight gain are independent risk factors for CML however no study evaluated the role of obesity in the disease progression while more studies investigate the impact of translocation types. Method: We conducted a retrospective analysis of the files of 37 patients being treated in our center for CML in chronic phase (CMP-CP) with known BCR-ABL1 breakpoints, Results: patients’ management and response assessment was done based on ELN 2013 guidelines. Analysis is done based on two main groups, obese vs normal BMI, and then based on BCR-ABL1 transcripts: e13a2 vs e14a2. Although the number of cases is limited, in the patient-cohort studied an e14a2 BCR-ABL1 transcript type / normal body weight was associated with an inferior outcome when compared to e13a2 transcript / obesity groups Conclusion: our finding suggest the need to enlarge the series to better evaluate a potential role of altered metabolism and/or specific transcripts in the response to TKI in CML.