A prospective analysis of symptom burden for patients with chronic myeloid leukemia in chronic phase treated with frontline second- and third-generation tyrosine kinase inhibitors.

Background: Treatment with tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) for patients with chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) is effective but needs to continue for several years, possibly indefinitely. Although generally safe, TKI may have hitherto poorly recognized effects in the quality of life (QoL) of such patients.

Methods: We prospectively measured the symptom burden of patients with chronic phase CML enrolled on frontline TKI trials with dasatinib, nilotinib, or ponatinib.