Effect of body mass index on the outcome of children with acute myeloid leukemia
Cancer, 06/04/2012
Inaba H et al. – An unhealthy BMI was associated with worse survival and more treatment-related mortality in children with AML.
Methods- Children with AML (n = 314) who were enrolled in 4 consecutive St. Jude protocols were grouped according to BMI (underweight, <5th percentile; healthy weight, 5th to 85th percentile; and overweight/obese, >/= 85th percentile).
- Twenty-five patients (8%) were underweight, 86 patients (27.4%) were overweight/obese, and 203 patients (64.6%) had healthy weight.
- The 5-year overall survival rate of overweight/obese patients (46.5% ± 7.3%) was lower than the rate of patients with healthy weight (67.1% ± 4.3%; P < .001); underweight patients also tended to have lower survival rates (50.6% ± 10.7%; P = .18).
- In a multivariable analysis that was adjusted for age, leukocyte count, French-American-British classification, and study protocols, patients with healthy weight had the best survival rate among the 3 groups (P = .01).
- When BMI was considered as continuous variable, patients with lower or higher BMI percentiles had worse survival (P = .03).
- There was no difference in the occurrence of induction failure or relapse among BMI groups, although underweight and overweight/obese patients had a significantly higher cumulative incidence of treatment-related mortality, especially because of infection (P = .009).
