RAS and TP53 can predict survival in adults with T‐cell lymphoblastic leukemia treated with hyper‐CVAD

Abstract

Abstract Adult T‐cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (T‐ALL) is a heterogeneous group of acute leukemias that account for about one third of all cases of Philadelphia chromosome (Ph)‐negative ALL. Recently, a molecular classifier using the mutational status of NOTCH1, FBXW7, RAS, and PTEN (NFRP) has been shown to distinguish low‐ vs high‐risk groups in adult T‐ALL patients treated using the Berlin‐Frankfurt‐Münster ALL protocol. However, it is unknown if this molecular classifier can stratify adult T‐ALL patients treated with hyper‐CVAD ± nelarabine. We identified a relatively small cohort of 27 adults with T‐ALL who were uniformly treated with hyper‐CVAD ± nelarabine with available mutational analysis at time of diagnosis. The most commonly mutated genes in this group were NOTCH1 (52%), NRAS (22%), DNMT3A (19%), KRAS (15%), and TP53 (7%). The NFRP molecular classifier failed to stratify overall survival (OS; P = .84) and relapse‐free survival (RFS; P = .18) in this cohort. We developed a new stratification model combining K/NRAS and TP53 mutations as high‐risk factors and showed that mutations in these genes predicted poorer OS (P = .03) and RFS (P = .04). While the current study is limited by cohort size, these data suggest that the NFRP molecular classifier might not be applicable to adult T‐ALL patients treated with hyper‐CVAD ± nelarabine. RAS/TP53 mutation status, however, was useful in risk stratification in adults with T‐ALL.

Keywords

• RAS
• risk stratification
• T‐cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia
• TP53