t(4;21) (p16;q22) in blastic crisis of a chronic myeloid leukemia with variant Philadelphia translocation.

A chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) patient who had presented a t(2;9;22) translocation during the chronic phase developed an unusual t(4;21) (p16;q22) translocation during the M2 type FAB classification blastic crisis. The role of these two recombinant chromosomes in the genesis of the terminal phase is discussed, particularly as the breakpoint on chromosome 21 near to the ets-2 oncogene locus, seems to be the same as that described in the t(8;21) (q22;q22) translocation specific of type M2 AML.