Karyotype analysis in chronic myelogenous leukemia. A three-year experience at the American University of Beirut Medical Center (AUBMC).

We report the results of karyotype analysis on cases referred to our laboratory for chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML) over a period of three years. A total of 68 patient were referred and a karyotype was successfully obtained in all cases except one. Thirty-one percent of cases were found to have a normal karyotype, 58.5% were Philadelphia (Ph1) positive while 10.5% of cases had chromosome abnormalities other than Ph1. Among the Ph1 positive cases, 92% had the standard translocation (9;22), 7.7% had a variant translocation and 12.8% had additional chromosome abnormalities. Our results are compared to those generally reported in the literature and the comparisons are discussed.