Type 4 cyclic AMP (cAMP) phosphodiesterase (PDE4) inhibitors, a class of compounds in clinical development that activate cAMP-mediated signaling by inhibiting cAMP catabolism, offer a feasible means by which to potentiate glucocorticoid-mediated apoptosis in lymphoid malignancies such as B-cell chronic lymphocytic leukemia (B-CLL). In this study, we show that PDE4 inhibitors up-regulate glucocorticoid receptor (GRa) transcript levels in B-CLL cells but not T-CLL cells or Sezary cells or normal circulating T cells, B cells, monocytes, or neutrophils. Because GRa transcript half-life does not vary in CLL cells treated with the prototypic PDE4 inhibitor rolipram, the 4-fold increase in GRa mRNA levels observed within 4 h of rolipram treatment seems to result from an increase in GRa transcription. Rolipram treatment increases levels of transcripts derived from the1A3 promoter to a greater extent than the 1B promoter.Treatment of B-CLL cells with two other PDE4 inhibitors currently in clinical development also augments GR transcript levels and glucocorticoid-mediated apoptosis. Washout studies show that simultaneous treatment with both drug classes irreversibly augments apoptosis over the same time frame that GR upregulation occurs. Although treatment of B-CLL cells with glucocorticoids reduces basal GRa transcript levels in a dose-related manner, cotreatment with rolipram maintained GRa transcript levels above baseline. Our results suggest that as a result of their unusual sensitivity to PDE4 inhibitor^mediated up-regulation of GRa expression, treatment of B-CLL patients with combined PDE4 inhibitor/glucocorticoid therapy may be of therapeutic benefit in this disease.Glucocorticoids are an important component of standard therapy for several lymphoid malignancies, including multiple myeloma, acute lymphoblastic leukemia, and diffuse large B-cell lymphoma. As early studies in patients with B-cell chronic lymphocytic leukemia (B-CLL) showed that addition of prednisone to chlorambucil augmented response rate but not median survival, glucocorticoids are not generally a standard component of initial therapy for patients with B-CLL (1, 2). Nonetheless, two studies of high-dose glucocorticoid therapy have suggested that glucocorticoids can be of clinical benefit to a subset of patients with treatment-refractory B-CLL (3, 4).Despite frequent responses to glucocorticoid treatment, monotherapy with glucocorticoids is not curative in any lymphoid malignancy, but the mechanisms underlying clinical glucocorticoid resistance remain controversial. Structural alterations in the glucocorticoid receptor (GR) are commonly identified in lymphoid cell lines that have been selected for glucocorticoid resistance by prolonged culture in dexamethasone, but comparable alterations in primary malignant lymphoid cells have been only infrequently reported (5 -9). A detailed analysis of treated B-CLL patients failed to identify abnormalities in either the DNA-or steroid-binding domains of leukemic GRs (10). Nonstructural modifications of ...