Detection of serum anti p53 antibodies and their correlation with p53 mutations in myelodysplastic syndromes and acute myeloid leukemia.

In solid tumors, p53 antibodies are found in 30% of the patients with p53 mutations, and their analysis is an interesting method for the detection of p53 mutations. We looked for circulating p53 antibodies in 83 patients with myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) or acute myeloid leukemia (AML), by an ELISA technique. Detection of p53 mutations was made by single stranded conformation polymorphism (SSCP) analysis of exons 4 to 10 of the P53 gene and confirmed by direct sequencing. Circulating antibodies to p53 were seen in three of the 83 (3.5%) patients analyzed, and a p53 point mutation was found in ten cases. Two of the three patients with p53 antibodies had a p53 mutation, but the remaining case had no detectable mutation. The other eight mutated cases had no detectable p53 antibodies. Our findings show that serological analysis of p53 antibodies is rarely positive in MDS and AML. This could be due to the relatively low incidence of p53 mutations seen in those disorders, but also to the immune depression to which they are often associated.