Bcl-2 inhibitors and DMF synergistically induce cell death in primary patient CTCL cells and CTCL cell lines. (A) Specific cell death in primary CD4⁺ cells isolated from 5 patients with Sézary syndrome (left), SeAx (middle) or HH cells (right) (n = 4 for HH and SeAx) upon treatment with 100 nM ABT-199, 30 µM DMF or the combination of both drugs. *P < .05 from ABT-199 monotreatment. (B) Western blot analysis of caspase 3 cleavage in SeAx and HH cells (as indicated) after treatment with 100 or 1000 nM ABT-199, 50 µM DMF or the combination of 1000 nM ABT-199 and 50µM DMF, as indicated. (C) Representative western blot analysis of SeAx Bcl-2 expression following AMAXA transfection with different siRNAs against bcl-2 after 24 hours. (D) Quantification of signal intensities from western blots for Bcl-2 in SeAx cells following AMAXA transfection with different siRNAs against Bcl-2 after 24 hours (n = 4). *P < .05 from scrambled siRNA control. (E) Specific cell death in SeAx cells transfected with different siRNAs against bcl-2 for 24 hours and treated with 30 µM DMF for another 24 hours (n = 4). *P < .05 from scrambled siRNA control.