In this report, we describe a case of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) with morphologic and immunophenotypic findings typical of acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL), but conventional cytogenetics, fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH), and real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) showed no evidence of retinoic acid receptor alpha (RARA) abnormality. This evidence concerns the gene RARA and acute promyelocytic leukemia.