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. 2022 Jan:160:72-79.
doi: 10.1016/j.ejca.2021.10.004. Epub 2021 Nov 13.

Minimal residual disease and outcome characteristics in infant KMT2A-germline acute lymphoblastic leukaemia treated on the Interfant-06 protocol

J Stutterheim  1 , P de Lorenzo  2 , I M van der Sluis  3 , J Alten  4 , P Ancliffe  5 , A Attarbaschi  6 , L Aversa  7 , J M Boer  8 , A Biondi  9 , B Brethon  10 , P Diaz  11 , G Cazzaniga  12 , G Escherich  13 , A Ferster  14 , R S Kotecha  15 , B Lausen  16 , Alex Wk Leung  17 , F Locatelli  18 , L Silverman  19 , J Stary  20 , T Szczepanski  21 , V H J van der Velden  22 , A Vora  5 , J Zuna  23 , M Schrappe  24 , M G Valsecchi  25 , R Pieters  26
Affiliations
Free article

Minimal residual disease and outcome characteristics in infant KMT2A-germline acute lymphoblastic leukaemia treated on the Interfant-06 protocol

J Stutterheim et al. Eur J Cancer. 2022 Jan.
Free article

Abstract

Background: The outcome of infants with KMT2A-germline acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL) is superior to that of infants with KMT2A-rearranged ALL but has been inferior to non-infant ALL patients. Here, we describe the outcome and prognostic factors for 167 infants with KMT2A-germline ALL enrolled in the Interfant-06 study.

Methods: Univariate analysis on prognostic factors (age, white blood cell count at diagnosis, prednisolone response and CD10 expression) was performed on KMT2A-germline infants in complete remission at the end of induction (EOI; n = 163). Bone marrow minimal residual disease (MRD) was measured in 73 patients by real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction at various time points (EOI, n = 68; end of consolidation, n = 56; and before OCTADAD, n = 57). MRD results were classified as negative, intermediate (<5∗10-4), and high (≥5∗10-4).

Results: The 6-year event-free and overall survival was 73.9% (standard error [SE] = 3.6) and 87.2% (SE = 2.7). Relapses occurred early, within 36 months from diagnosis in 28 of 31 (90%) infants. Treatment-related mortality was 3.6%. Age <6 months was a favourable prognostic factor with a 6-year disease-free survival (DFS) of 91% (SE = 9.0) compared with 71.7% (SE = 4.2) in infants >6 months of age (P = 0.04). Patients with high EOI MRD ≥5 × 10-4 had a worse outcome (6-year DFS 61.4% [SE = 12.4], n = 16), compared with patients with undetectable EOI MRD (6-year DFS 87.9% [SE = 6.6], n = 28) or intermediate EOI MRD <5 × 10-4 (6-year DFS 76.4% [SE = 11.3], n = 24; P = 0.02).

Conclusion: We conclude that young age at diagnosis and low EOI MRD seem favourable prognostic factors in infants with KMT2A-germline ALL and should be considered for risk stratification in future clinical trials.

Keywords: ALL; Infant; KMT2A-germline; MRD; Prognosis.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflict of interest statement The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

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