Interrogation of molecular profiles can help in differentiating between MDS and AML with MDS-related changes

Abstract

A subset of AML with myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS)-related changes (MRCs) occurs without a documented MDS phase. We studied genomic profile of 646 patients: 310 with MDS, 167 with AML without (w/o) MRC, 99 with primary (p) AML-MRC, and 70 with secondary (s) AML-MRC and sought to find differences in mutational patterns. Among the 32-myeloid associated genes studied, SF3B1 (p ≤ .001) was significantly mutated in higher proportion of patients with MDS, compared to other categories. NPM1 (p < .001), FLT3 ITD (p = .08), and NRAS (p = .02) mutations showed trend toward significance for AML w/o MRC, compared to other categories. In pAML-MRC, TP53 (p < .001) was significantly mutated in higher proportion of patients. Similarly, SETBP1 (p = .001), RUNX1 (p = .004), and SRSF2 (p = .04) mutations were more commonly seen in sAML-MRC. While these signatures may not be diagnostically discriminatory, they may help in disease categorization when other data are absent or in challenging cases.

Keywords:

• MDS
• AML with MRC
• detectable gene mutations

Author contributions

TB, AS, JS and MOH designed the research, analyzed the data, interpreted the results and wrote the manuscript; DS, RK, JL and EP contributed patients assisted in manuscript preparation; all authors approved the final draft of the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.