Chronic myelomonocytic leukemia as a cause of fatal uncontrolled inflammation in familial Mediterranean fever

We report on a familial Mediterranean fever (FMF) patient homozygous for p.M694V in the MEFV gene who developed chronic myelomonocytic leukemia (CMML) leading to an uncontrolled and fatal inflammatory syndrome. Plasma levels of IL-6 and IL-18 were found to be very high, as compared to healthy controls and CMML-free FMF patients. Our study unveils the interplay between two different disorders involving the same target cells, suggesting that in myelodysplasia with inflammatory manifestations, mutations in genes causing autoinflammatory syndromes, like MEFV, can be present and thus could be sought. Early chemotherapy with interleukin inhibitors could be proposed in such unusual situations. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13023-015-0295-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.