Factors affecting thrombohemorrhagic early death in patients with acute promyelocytic leukemia treated with arsenic trioxide alone

Abstract

Acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL) is often accompanied by a potentially devastating coagulopathy. Predictors of thrombohemorrhagic early death (TH-ED)/early bleeding death are not well characterized. In this retrospective study, eleven baseline clinical variables that can be assessed easily and promptly were chosen for evaluation in a cohort of 364 patients with APL who were administered arsenic trioxide (ATO) alone as remission induction therapy. TH-ED was defined as death from bleeding or thrombosis within 30 days after hospital admission. Cox proportional hazards regression model was used for both the univariate and multivariate analyses. Totally, 53 patients died from severe bleeding (51 cases) or thrombosis (2 cases), and at 30 days the cumulative incidences of TH-ED were 14.6%. Six independent risk factors for TH-ED were identified, including relapse, male, white blood cell (WBC) count above 10 × 10⁹/L, fibrinogen level below 1 g/L, D-dimer level above 4 mg/L and increased creatinine level. Increased creatinine level was the most powerful risk factor, followed by WBC count > 10 × 10⁹/L. This study identified risk factors for TH-ED in a large cohort of patients with APL, which enriched clinical information on identifying patients at high risk of TH-ED.

Keywords: Acute promyelocytic leukemia; Arsenic trioxide; Predictor; Thrombohemorrhagic early death.