Chemosensitivity testing of fresh human leukemia cells using both a dye exclusion assay and a tetrazolium dye (MTT) assay.

Chemosensitivity testing using a DEA was performed on 91 leukemia samples from 70 patients with leukemia. In 55 patients, comparison of in-vitro results with actual response of the patient was made. There was good correlation in 82% of the cases, the results being highly significant p less than 0.001. The MTT assay was also adapted for the chemosensitivity testing and the usefulness of this assay was evaluated by comparing the results to the DEA for 24 of the samples. Survival results produced by the two assays were very similar. The MTT procedure was also found to be equally effective as the DEA as a predictive assay of chemosensitivity.