Arsenic trioxide replacing or reducing chemotherapy in consolidation therapy for acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL2012 trial).

As all- retinoic acid (ATRA) and arsenic trioxide (ATO) are widely accepted in treating acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL), deescalating toxicity becomes a research hotspot. Here, we evaluated whether chemotherapy could be replaced or reduced by ATO in APL patients at different risks. After achieving complete remission with ATRA-ATO-based induction therapy, patients were randomized (1:1) into ATO and non-ATO groups for consolidation: ATRA-ATO versus ATRA-anthracycline for low-/intermediate-risk patients, or ATRA-ATO-anthracycline versus ATRA-anthracycline-cytarabine for high-risk patients.

Pregnancies in patients with chronic myeloid leukemia treated with tyrosine kinase inhibitor.

We presented our experience in chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) patients who conceived children and/or became pregnant while receiving tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI). Among 7 male patients, 7 pregnancies resulted in the birth of 7 healthy babies. Among 18 female patients, 8 ended in elective abortion; 3 had spontaneous abortion, and 7 carried to term, resulting in the birth of 8 healthy babies.

[Nilotinib treatment for imatinib resistant or intolerant chronic myelogenous leukemia.].

Objective: To evaluate the safety and efficacy of nilotinib in chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML) patients with resistance or intolerance to imatinib.

Methods: Thirty-five CML patients after imatinib failure or intolerance received oral administration of 400 mg nilotinib twice daily. The overall survival, hematologic and cytogenetic responses, as well as adverse events were evaluated.

Reassessment of the prognostic factors of international prognostic index (IPI) in the patients with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma in an era of R-CHOP in Chinese population.

We performed this study to reassess the prognostic factors of diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) in the era of rituximab, cyclophosphamide, doxorubicin, vincristine, and prednisone (R-CHOP) in Chinese population. One hundred and twenty-five consecutive patients with DLBCL were enrolled in this study from February 2000 to September 2006. They had received six courses of R-CHOP regimen consisting of rituximab 375 mg/m(2), intravenously, D1; cyclophosphamide 750 mg/m(2), bolus infusion, D2; doxorubicin 50 mg/m(2), bolus infusion, D2; vincristine 1.

[Prognostic factors analysis for R-CHOP regimen therapy in diffuse large B cell lymphoma].

Objective: To reassess the prognostic factors of diffuse large B cell lymphoma (DLBCL) treated with R-CHOP therapy.

Methods: One hundred and twenty five patients were enrolled in this study from Feb. 2000 to Sep.

[Efficacy and safety of imatinib in treatment of 151 chronic myeloid leukemia patients].

Objective: To evaluate the safety and efficacy of imatinib in treatment of chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) patients.

Methods: From December 2003 to March 2007, 151 patients entered Glivec International Patient Assistance Program (GIPAP) in our center and received imatinib therapy. The overall and progression free survival, hematologic, cytogenetic and molecular response, and adverse events were evaluated.

AML1-ETO and C-KIT mutation/overexpression in t(8;21) leukemia: implication in stepwise leukemogenesis and response to Gleevec.

To explore the genetic abnormalities that cooperate with AML1-ETO (AE) fusion gene to cause acute myeloid leukemia (AML) with t(8;21), we screened a number of candidate genes and identified 11 types of mutations in C-KIT gene (mC-KIT), including 6 previously undescribed ones among 26 of 54 (48.1%) cases with t(8;21). To address a possible chronological order between AE and mC-KIT, we showed that, among patients with AE and mC-KIT, most leukemic cells at disease presentation harbored both genetic alteration, whereas in three such cases investigated during complete remission, only AE, but not mC-KIT, could be detected by allele-specific PCR.