Low expression of SETD2 predicts a poor outcome in MDS patients. (A) Overall survival of patients with refractory anemia with excess blasts, a subtype of MDS, was stratified by SETD2 expression into SETD2 low (z score < −0.9; n = 13; median survival, 1.0 year) and normal (−0.9 ≤ z score ≤ 0.9; n = 50; median survival, 2.8 years) groups. Statistical significance was evaluated by log-rank test. (B) qPCR analysis of expression of SETD2 in BM mononuclear cells from healthy subjects (n = 13) and MDS patients (n = 35). (C) Overall survival of the MDS patients stratified by CD34 expression. The absolute average of relative CD34 expression was used as the criterion to stratify the patients into CD34 low (n = 91; median survival, 4.4 years) and high (n = 92; median survival, 2.9 years) groups. (D) Differential expression of SETD2 in the CD34⁺ cells of MDS patients with CD34 low (L) and high (H) expression. The same criterion was used to stratify the patients as in panel C. (E) qPCR analysis of SETD2 expression in the BM CD34⁺ cells of the MDS patients with low or high platelet (PLT)/megakaryocyte counts. (F) qPCR analysis of SETD2 expression in the primary BM CD34⁺ cells treated with 5 nM decitabine or vehicle control for 48 hours. The patient samples in panels A, C, and D are from GEO (GSE19429) expression microarrays, and those in the other panels are from our own samples. *P < .05; **P < .01; ***P < .001; ****P < .0001.