Additional translocation (8;21)(q22;q22) in a patient with philadelphia- positive chronic myelogenous leukaemia in the blastic phase

We report a case of Philadelphia-positive chronic myelogenous leukaemia in blastic phase with the additional translocation (8;21)(q22;q22), which is frequent in acute myeloid leukaemia but not in chronic myelogenous leukaemia. The t(8;21) was not detected in the chronic phase, and was the only additional chromosomal anomaly in the blastic clone. Reverse transcription- polymerase chain reaction revealed the AML1/ETO fusion transcript in the cells of blastic phase but not in those of chronic phase. Regarding t(9;22), the breakpoint on chromosome 22 occurred in the μ-BCR region of the BCR gene, resulting in hybrid BCR/ABL mRNA with an e19a2 junction. Our findings provided molecular evidence that t(8;21) can occur as an additional genetic change in Philadelphia-positive chronic myelogenous leukaemia.