A 55-year-old man comes to the office with a long history of fatigue and exertional dyspnea. He has early satiety and frequent upper abdominal discomfort. On physical examination, the patient has palpable splenomegaly but no lymphadenopathy. Laboratory tests are as follows: Reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction is used to diagnose chronic myelogenous leukemia in this patient. Which of the following is most likely to be detected by this test?

Question

A 55-year-old man comes to the office with a long history of fatigue and exertional dyspnea.  He has early satiety and frequent upper abdominal discomfort.  On physical examination, the patient has palpable splenomegaly but no lymphadenopathy.  Laboratory tests are as follows:  Reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction is used to diagnose chronic myelogenous leukemia in this patient.  Which of the following is most likely to be detected by this test?

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

Eductional Objective: Reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) is used to detect and quantify levels of mRNA in a sample.  It uses reverse transcription to create a complementary DNA template that is then amplified using the standard PCR procedure.  RT-PCR can be used to diagnose chronic myelogenous leukemia by identifying an mRNA transcript containing both BCR and ABL exons in affected cells.

A 55-Year-Old Man Comes to the Office with a Long