Abstract

Objective: To determine the frequency of two transcripts of BCR-ABL 1 fusion gene (P210 & P190) in acute lymphoblastic leukemia and chronic myelogenous leukemia by reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction. Study design: A cross-sectional study. Place and duration of study: The Armed Forces Institute of Pathology (AFIP), Rawalpindi, from December 2012 to January 2014. Methodology: 147 diagnosed patients of CML and ALL were subjected to real time reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction. For PCR,2-3ml of venous blood in EDTA was collected .RNA extraction was done by Trizol Reagent LS (MRC, USA) and cDNA was synthesized using reverse transcriptase and gene specific primer. Real time- PCR was done on ABI-7500.The positive samples were identified when fluorescence exceeded threshold limit. Results: Out of 147 samples, 85 were with diagnosis of CML. All of them (100%) showed P210. 58 patients had diagnosis of ALL. Out of these BCR-ABL1 is detected in 11(18.9%) patients. 9(81.8%) expressed P190 whereas P210 was present in 2(18.1%) patients. 4 patients in lymphoid blast phase of CML were identified. 3(75%) of them had PP210 and 1(25%) shows both (P190 & P210) the transcripts. Conclusion: All CML patients expressed P210 transcript whereas ALL patients mostly showed P190. These transcripts expressing specific tyrosine kinase protein have diagnostic as well prognostic significance.

Keywords

chronic myelogenous leukemia, acute lymphoblastic leukemia, real time polymerase chain reaction