Background: Aberrant expression of HOX gene expression has been observed in cancer. The purpose of thisstudy was to investigate the alteration of HOXA5 and HOXA9 expression and their clinical significance in acutemeloid leukemia (AML). Materials and Methods: The expression of HOXA5 and HOXA9 genes of bone marrowsamples from 75 newly diagnosed AML patients and 22 healthy controls for comparison were examined by Realtimequantitative PCR (RQ-PCR) assay. Statistical analysis was conducted to evaluate HOXA5 and HOXA9expression as possible biomarkers for AML. Results: The results showed that the complete remission rate (52.6%)of the patients who highly expressed HOXA5 and HOXA9 was significantly lower than that (88.9%) in patientswho lowly express the genes (P=0.015). Spearmann correlation coefficients indicated that the expression levelsfor HOXA5 and HOXA9 genes were highly interrelated (r=0.657, P<0.001). Meanwhile, we detected significantcorrelations between HOXA9 expression and age in this limited set of patients (P=0.009). Conclusions: Theresults suggest a prognostic impact of increased expression of HOXA5 and HOXA9 in AML patients.
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