Evaluation of leukemic cell chromosomes as a guide to therapy.

Recent improvements in methodology permit a clonal chromosome abnormality to be identified in most cases of acute leukemia. As a consequence, leukemic cell chromosome evaluation is finding increased usefulness for diagnosis, prognosis and therapy. In this paper we review examples of the clinical utility of leukemic cell karyotype analysis drawn primarily from a recent study at the University of Minnesota for acute nonlymphoblastic leukemia and from the Third International Workshop on Chromosomes in Leukemia for acute lymphoblastic leukemia.