Predicting which subsets of patients with myelodysplastic neoplasms are more likely to progress to overt chronic myelomonocytic leukemia.

Abstract

The boundary between myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) and chronic myelomonocytic leukemia (CMML) has been revised in the latest World Health Organization classification of myeloid malignancies. These changes were motivated by the description of a subgroup of MDS patients identified as oligomonocytic chronic myelomonocytic leukemia (OM-CMML) at risk of evolving into overt CMML. Various studies will be reviewed describing the clinical and biological features of MDS patients evolving to CMML. The efforts to discover biomarkers enabling the identification of these patients at the time of MDS diagnosis will be discussed. Finally, the molecular landscape of these patients will be presented with a specific focus on the biallelic inactivation of TET2 in light of its functional impact on hematopoietic stem cells, granule-monocytic differentiation, and its tight interplay with inflammation.