Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) in younger adults: A retrospective study of 133 cases

✍ Scribed by Giulio De Rossi; Franco Mandelli; Alfredo Covelli; Matteo Luciani; Maurizio Martelli; Luigi Resegotti; Antonio Alberti; Aurelio Cajozzo; Luigi Derriu; Raffaele De Biasi; Giorgio Broccia; Antonio Abbadessa; Francesco Caronia; Pietro Leone

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1989
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 557 KB
• Volume: 7
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0278-0232
• DOI: 10.1002/hon.2900070204

✦ Synopsis

Clinical and biological data have been evaluated, using both univariate and Cox's multivariate statistical analyses, in a series of 133 Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia (CLL) patients with a mean age of 46.6 years (range 31-50).

In univariate analyses, anemia (Hb < 13 g/dl), peripheral blood (PB) lymphocytosis (> 40 x 10'11) and bone marrow (BM) lymphocytosis (> 80 per cent)?were shown to be of significant prognostic value.

Multivariate analysis, through a forward stepwise procedure, showed that the most important and independent variable is the BM lymphocytosis. These results are different from those obtained in previous studies and particularly in a recent identical study performed by the same Cooperative Group on 1777 patients with a mean age of 64.2 years (Mandelli eta [., 1987).

No significance can be demonstrated in stratifying this series of younger patients according to different staging methods Binet et al., 1981 b;. Therefore this population of CLL patients, with less than 50 years of age, has risk factors quite different from classical CLL.

The results of the present study show that the diagnostic approach to B-CLL in younger adults must be more complete: using the common diagnostic criteria, established staging systems appear to be inadequate in this series of younger patients.