The characteristics of core binding factor (CBF) leukemia appear to differ between Chinese and Caucasian patients. In this study, we analyzed the biological and clinical characteristics of 76 Chinese CBF leukemia patients out of 425 newly diagnosed acute myeloid leukemia (AML) patients. The frequency of CBF AML was 17.9%. Patients harboring t(8;21) were predominant in CBF AML The incidence of c-kit mutation in CBF AML was 28.9%. The N822K mutation appeared to be more prevalent in Chinese CBF AML patients. Multivariate analysis showed that c-kit mutation and high white blood cell count could negatively impact overall survival (OS) (HR = 2.74 and 6.24. P = 0.007 and 0.022, respectively) but did not affect relapse-free survival (RFS). Kaplan-Meier analysis showed a significant difference in both OS and RFS between wildtype and mutated c-kit patients. Although we had included recently reported prognostic indicators in our analysis, our results demonstrated that only c-kit mutation and high white blood cell count had prognostic impact on Chinese CBF AML patients. (C) 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.