[Acute leukemia and breast cancer : apropos of 12 cases observed in the Department of Oncology at the Henri Mondor Hospital].
The authors report 12 cases of acute leukemia observed after breast cancer. 4 patients received only adjuvant radiotherapy, whereas the other eight received both chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Acute leukemia appeared with a mean time of 5.5 years after the detection of breast cancer and was preceded in 7 cases by isolated pancytopenia during 4 months. Acute leukemias were always non lymphoblastic and myelofibrosis was very frequent. A complete remission was obtained at three patients out of the seven treated. The mean survival time was 5.6 months. The existence of acute leukemia after chemo-and/or radiotherapy poses several problems. The detection of patients with a high risk of leukemia by different methods such as cytogenetic, studies of dysmyelopoietic symptoms, is actually often too late occurring during preleukemia states of bad prognosis. We also need to know the exact incidence of secondary leukemia after treatment of breast carcinoma and the real benefit of such treatment.