Prognostic relevance of CD69 expression in B cell chronic lymphocytic leukemia

This study aimed to determine the prognostic impact of CD69 expression in B cell chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL). The study included 153 B cell chronic lymphocytic leukemia (B-CLL) recruited to Mansoura Oncology Center. Cellular CD69 expression was determined by multicolor flow cytometry in parallel with PCR amplification and sequencing analysis to mutational status of immunoglobulin variable heavy chain (IgVH). The number of CLL patients positively expressed CD69 was 47 out of 153 (30.7%). There is significant association between CD69-positive expression and unmutated IgVH and between CD69 negative expressions with mutated IgVH gene (P < 0.007). The patients positively expressed CD69 were younger in age and had higher leukocyte count, advanced RIA stages III and IV, and high β2 microglobulin as compared to negative ones. CLL patients group positively expressed CD69 had short overall survival and progression disease-free survival (PDFS) as compared to negative ones. Cox proportional hazard regression model showed that positive CD69 expression is an independent prognostic biomarker for progression-free survival (HR for CD69 vs IgVH was 1.7 vs 1.6, p = 0.04 vs 0.02) and OS (HR 1.8 vs 1.9, p = 0.03 vs 0.01). In conclusion, positive CD69 expression could predict adverse outcome; it could be included in scoring system of CLL as simple, easy applicable to stratify early progressive patients and enabling timely therapeutic decisions to improve outcome. Also, it could be a target for therapy for B cell CLL.