University Publications

Aim: Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is a malignancy of proliferative, clonal, abnormally, or poorly differentiated cells of the hematopoietic system, characterized by clonal evolution and genetic heterogeneity. The Fms-like tyrosine kinase-3 (FLT3) is a receptor tyrosine kinase that plays a key role in cell survival, proliferation, and differentiation of hematopoietic stem cells. Mutations of FLT3 were first described in 1997 and account for the most frequent molecular mutations in AML. The aim of this study was to determine the frequency of FLT3 ITD mutation among Sudanese patients with acute myeloid leukemia and explore if it has a correlation with FAB subtypes of acute Myeloblastic leukemia or not. Material and Methods: One hundred patients diagnosed based on morphological, immunophenotype, and molecular genetics with acute myeloblastic leukemia were enrolled in this study; blood samples or bone marrow samples were collected from all patients in ethylene diamine tetra acetic acid; genomic DNA was extracted from all samples using guanidine method, and analyzed for FLT3- internal tandem duplication mutation using conventional polymerase chain reaction. Results: One hundred acute myeloblastic leukemic patients already diagnosed with acute myeloblastic leukemia, grouped as 54 were newly diagnosed and 46 were under treatment, also 46 were males and 54 were females; the range of age was one-year-old to eighty years. FLT3 ITD mutation was positive in 8 (8%) of the patients, two (2%) of them were male and six (6%) were female; the mean age of the patients with the mutation was 32.9 years. Four (50%) of the cases with the mutation were FAB sub-type M2 and two (25%) was M5b. Conclusion: The frequency of FLT3 ITD mutation among Sudanese patients with acute myeloid leukemia participated in this study was found lower than other populations, and there was no correlation between the mutation and FAB subtypes.