Introduction
Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is the most common childhood malignancy worldwide.(1)
Over the past four decades, the treatment of ALL among children has improved dramatically. Despite this success, drug resistance and treatment failure due to treatment-related toxicity still occur in about 20% of patients.(2)
The multi-drug resistance 1 (MDR1) gene encodes a 170-kDa membrane transport protein called P-glycoprotein. One potential mechanism of drug resistance is mediated through the expression of the P-gp efflux pump, enabling ALL blasts to decrease intracellular toxic drug levels and thereby lower rates of apoptosis.(2, 3)
It was suggested that polymorphism of C3435T in exon 26 and C1236T in exon 12 of the MDR1 gene has a significant correlation with the P-gp expression level.(4)
Aim of the work
The aim of this work was to study MDR1 C3435T and MDR1 C1236T Polymorphisms in acute lymphoblastic leukemia patients and its relation to disease prognosis and response to treatment.