Prognosis Assessment of Early-Stage Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia: Are We Ready to Predict Clinical Evolution Without a Crystal Ball?

BACKGROUND: The discovery of new biologic variables with high prognostic effect has been accompanied by the emergence of different prognostic indexes (PIs) to assess the time to first treatment in patients with early-stage (Binet A) chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL). The present study compared the prognostic value of 5 PIs: CLL international prognostic index (CLL-IPI), Barcelona-Brno, international prognostic score-A (IPS-A), CLL-01, and a tailored approach. PATIENTS AND METHODS: We applied the 5 PIs to a cohort of 428 unselected patients with Binet A CLL from a multicenter Spanish database with clinical and biologic information available. The predictive value of the scores was assessed using Harrell's concordance index (C index) and area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC). RESULTS: We found a significant association between time to first treatment and risk subgroups for all 5 PIs used. The most accurate PI was the IPS-A (C-index, 0.72; AUC, 0.76), closely followed by CLL-01 (C-index, 0.69; AUC, 0.70), CLL-IPI (C-index, 0.69; AUC, 0.69), Barcelona-Brno (C-index, 0.67; AUC, 0.69), and the tailored approach (C-index, 0.61 and 0.58; AUC, 0.58 and 0.54). CONCLUSIONS: The concordance between the PIs was low (44%), suggesting that although all these PIs improve clinical staging and help physicians in routine clinical practice, it will be necessary to harmonize larger cohorts of patients to define the best PI for treatment decision-making in the real world.

Automated neutrophil morphology and its utility in the assessment of neutrophil dysplasia.

The automated hematology cell analyzer Coulter LH 750 (Beckman Coulter, Brea, CA, USA) uses a combination of 3 measurements-volume, conductivity, and scatter-to identify cells, but it could take advantage of these parameters to evaluate their morphologic changes. The neutrophil mean cell volume (MNEV), mean cell conductivity (MNEC), and mean cell scatter (MNES) were evaluated in 54 patients with myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS), 18 with chronic myelomonocytic leukemia (CMML), and 59 healthy controls. MNES and MNEC in the MDS group including all subtypes (World Health Organization classification) and in the CMML patients were significantly lower than the control group. MNES in MDS and CMML correlated well with the cytoplasmic hypogranularity evaluated by microscopic observation (P = .01). The value of MNES and MNEC as screening parameters in the neutrophil dysplasia evaluation showed, for this study, a sensitivity of 71.8% with a specificity of 86.4% (area under the curve [AUC], 0.817) and a cutoff of <139.3 for MNES and a sensitivity of 70.4% with a specificity of 76.3% (AUC, 0.752) and a cutoff of <150.9 for MNEC.