Prolonged Chronic Phase of greater than 10 Years of Chronic Myelogenous Leukemia in a Patient With Congenital Human Immunodefeciency Virus Infection

A 15-year-old male with congenital HIV infection was diagnosed with chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML) at age 4 years 9 months. HIV was initially treated with zidovudine. For the last >10 years he has received didanosine, lamivudine, and nelfinavir. CML was treated with Interferon alfa (INF-alpha) for >10 years and a brief course of hydroxyurea (HU). He remained in chronic phase CML since diagnosis however recent molecular monitoring revealed increased BCR/ABL transcripts necessitating a change in therapy to imatinib. The very prolonged chronic phase of CML in this patient has been unexpected especially in light of the underlying congenital HIV infection. Pediatr Blood Cancer 2009;53: 658-660. (C) 2009 Wiley-Liss, Inc.