RESUMO
We studied the response to treatment and survival of 30 adults with acute lymphocytic leukemia (ALL) and 19 with acute non lymphoid leukemia (ANLL) classified on basis of immunophenotype (monoclonal antibodies) and cytochemistry. For the ALL cases 70% corresponded to common ALL (CALLA positive), 23% to B lymphocytes and 7% to T cells. We had 68% of the ANLL patients classified as myeloid, 21% as hybrid (positive both myeloid and lymphoid markers) and 11% as undifferentiated. We analyzed demographic data (gender and age), basic laboratory values (hemoglobin, leucocytes, platelets and cytomorphology in peripheral blood and bone marrow) using the French-American-British classification, and found no statistically significant differences between ALL and ANLL. Three of four patients (75%) with hybrid ANLL achieved complete remission (CR), while 46% of cases with myeloid ANLL and none of the subjects with undifferentiated ANLL reached CR; these differences were not statistically significant. Patients with common ALL had a median survival (SV) of 499 days, for B cell ALL it was of 212 days, and for T cell ALL of 285 days. Our data suggest that: a) expression of lymphoid markers in patients with ANLL is probably associated with a higher CR ratio, and b) SV in adults with common ALL seems to be longer than in those with B and T cell ALL.