Extra chemo could be answer
Young patients with an aggressive form of leukemia who are likely to relapse after chemotherapy treatment can significantly reduce those odds by receiving additional courses of chemotherapy, suggest the findings of a clinical trial led by investigators at Harvard-affiliated Dana-Farber/Children’s Hospital Cancer Center in Boston. The trial leaders today presented the results of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL) Consortium study, which involved nearly 500 patients under age 18 with B-precursor acute lymphoblastic leukemia (B-ALL), at the annual meeting of the American Society of Hematology (ASH). Trial participants received an initial course of induction chemotherapy for B-ALL, a cancer of the blood that is one of the most common cancers in children younger than 15. After a month of treatment, the patients’ bone marrow samples were sent for a test able to measure levels of leukemia that cannot be seen under a microscope. Thirty-five of the patients were deemed to...