Frequency of mutant p53 among acute lymphoblastic leukemia patients in Basrah, Iraq

Abstract EN

study was carried out to investigate the status of p53 proteins and their relation to the occurrence of TEL-AML-1 translocation in children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) attending the oncology unit at Basrah maternity and children hospital during the period from May 2009 to April 2010.

A total of 100 blood samples were collected from 40 newly diagnosed ALL cases, and 60 healthy children served as controls.

Anti-p53 antibody was detected by an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), and TEL-AML-1 fusion gene was determined by reversetranscriptase polymerase reaction (RT-PCR) on RNA extracted from fresh blood samples.

The overall proportion of anti-p53 was 20% in the leukemic patients, whereas none of the healthy control group showed anti-p53 positivity.

This difference was statistically significant (P<0.05).

According to the French-American-British (FAB) classification, 75% of the anti-p53 positive cases were classified as L2 stage ALL.

There was a significant difference (P<0.05) between standard and high-risk groups of ALL patients in the frequency of anti-p53: 40% of high-risk group members had anti-p53 compared to 8% in the standard risk patients.

There was no association (P>0.05) between TEL-AML-1 translocation and anti-p53.

None of the standard risk patients with positive TEL-AML-1 fusion gene displayed the anti-p53 while 33.3% of TEL-AML-1 positive with high risk displayed the antip53 antibody.