How Is Acute Lymphocytic Leukemia Treated?

When deciding whether to receive treatment for acute lymphocytic leukemia (ALL), you should be aware of the goals of your therapy. Treatment may be given to increase the chance of a cure, to prolong survival, or to improve symptoms. You and your doctor should carefully balance the potential benefits of receiving cancer treatment with the potential risks.

Specific treatment for ALL will be based on:

• Your age, overall health, and medical history
• Extent of the disease
• Your tolerance for specific medications, procedures, or therapies
• Expectations for the course of the disease
• Your opinion or preference

Treatment may include:

• Chemotherapy
• Radiation therapy
• Bone marrow transplantation

The exact type of treatment you receive will depend on your individual situation and your prognosis. The information on this website is intended to help educate you about your treatment options. It can help you when you make decisions with the cancer specialist who treats you.

To understand the best treatment options available to you, you should find out from your doctor what kind of ALL you have. The following information affects the kind of treatment you might need:

• Do you have a B-cell or T-cell ALL?
• What is the histologic subtype (L1-L3) of your leukemia?
• What was your initial white blood cell count?
• What chromosomal abnormalities, if any, were found by cytogenetic examination?
• Do you have mature B-cell or Burkitt ALL? Do you have Ph-positive ALL? These will require very different treatment plans to cure the disease than the average case of ALL.
  
  

These are all tests that are performed on a sample obtained from the blood and bone marrow.

Clinical Trials

Most new treatments are developed in clinical trials. These are studies that evaluate the safety and effectiveness of new drugs or treatments. Clinical trials make it possible to develop more effective cancer treatments.

If you take part in a clinical trial, you may get better treatments. You will also help to advance knowledge about treatment of ALL. Clinical trials are available for most stages of cancer. If you are interested in participating in a clinical trial, you should discuss the risks and benefits of taking part with your physician. In any case, you should stay informed by following the news about cancer trials. In this way, you can make sure that you are receiving the best treatment available.

Children and Clinical Trials 

Most children receive treatment through government-sponsored clinical trials. In the United States, this is typically the National Cancer Institute (Children’s Cancer Study Group and Pediatric Oncology Group now merged with the Children's Oncology Group). These trials frequently study more intensive therapy for children at high risk of treatment failure, as well as less intensive therapy for better risk patients. It is important that children be treated in these clinical studies whenever possible to ensure that all of the therapy is correctly administered and to further the knowledge of treatment of childhood ALL.

Click here for more information about ALL.