Management of Acute Myeloid Leukemia

PubMed, the Internet portal of biomedical and life sciences literature, indexed an interesting article, entitled “Therapeutic Strategies in the Management of Acute Myeloid Leukemia.” (Med Klin (Munich). 2007 Apr;102(4):309-316). Authors are Fiegl M, Hiddemann W and Braess J. Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is a rare disease of the hematopoietic stem cell leading to uncontrolled proliferation of immature progenitor cells. This results in a replacement of healthy hematopoiesis and in pancytopenia with corresponding symptoms (anemia, thrombo- and granulocytopenia). Diagnosis can reliably be confirmed by bone marrow aspiration, which also allows risk stratification by cytogenetic and molecular analysis. Therapy of AML that should preferentially be performed in clinical studies comprises induction therapy for achievement of complete cytomorphological remission (CR) and postremission strategies consisting of consolidation and maintenance therapy for eradication of residual blasts. To access the full abstract of the article, click here.