Oxidative Stress in Patients With Early Stage Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia, Assessment and Correlation With Prognostic Factors

Abstract

Background: The heterogeneous clinical outcome that characterizes chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) can be predicted by a serie of clinical prognosis factors. However, the existence of a significant subset of patients with early stage CLL makes crucial the need of more accurate prognostic markers allowing the possibility of early treatment of these patients. Although high reactive oxygen species (ROS) levels have been seen to play a role in CLL, discrepancies in the information compiled about oxidative stress (OS) in these patients have been reported.

Methods: In this study, we evaluate the overall OS status, through a recently defined score of oxidative stress (SOS), of 37 early stage CLL patients and we compare SOS with well-known prognosis factors and with a matched control group of healthy individuals.

Results: We have observed an imbalance in the antioxidant/prooxidant equilibrium in early stage CLL patients with a significant higher SOS than that of the healthy control group (0.00 0.53 vs. 2.97 1.13; P < 0.05). Most of the patients who exhibit 3 - 4 adverse prognosis factors also present higher values of most of the OS biomarkers and SOS.

Conclusions: These data strongly suggest that the combination strategy of OS biomarkers with already known prognosis factor may have potential clinical applications in early stage CLL patients.




doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.4021/jh34w