Three adults with acute lymphoblastic leukemia and dic(7;9)(p11.2;p11)

We report the cases of three adults with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) who had a dic(7;9)(p11.2;p11) on the diagnostic bone marrow cytogenetic analysis. All three were males with B-ALL (aged 25, 38, and 48 years) who at presentation had 90–100% replacement of marrow with lymphoblasts. One patient died 23 months post induction therapy, which was 9 months post allogeneic stem cell transplantation (SCT); as of writing, the other two patients were in remission and well, one of them at 4 years after SCT and the other at 7.5 years without SCT. To our knowledge, these cases are the first reported in adult ALL with dic(7;9) and demonstrate a consistent phenotype, with good initial response to therapy but variable long-term outcome.