The Expression Of B7-H4and Its Relationship With Clinical Characters In Acute Leukemia

Objective:To explore the expression of B7-H4protein and its relationship with clinical characters in patients with acute leukemia (AL).Methods:A total of50patients admitted into hematology department of First Affiliated Hospital of Zhejiang Medical University from April2010to March2012were enrolled, including38acute myeloid leukemia (AML) and12acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). The expression of B7-H4protein was examined in these blast cells of bone marrow in50patients by flow cytometry. The expression levels of B7-H4were compared in two subtype groups and the relationship between the expression of B7-H4and clinical features and prognosis of AL patients were studied by statistic analysis.Results:Compared with AML, the expression of B7-H4in ALL was higher (50.0%vs21.1%). Among50AL patients, B7-H4was not correlated with age(p=0.226), gender(p=0.066), the percentage of bone marrow blast cells in initial tests (p=0.446),white blood cells(p=0.722), hemoglobin(p=0.781), platelets(p=0.412). The deadline for follow-up of these50AL patients was March1st in2015, though the result of Kaplan-Meier survival analysis showed the expression levels of B7-H4had no effect in overall survival(p=0.094), the mortality of the group with high expression of B7-H4(84.6%) was higher than the low expression group (59.3%). Conclusions:The expression of B7-H4in ALL group was higher than AML group,which suggesting that the level of B7-H4is associated with the classification of acute leukemia. The higher mortality in high expression group infer B7-H4might be one of negative factors in poor prognosis of AL patients.