Newly Defined Leukemia Responds to Tyrosine Kinase Inhibitors

Young patients with Ph-like acute lymphoblastic leukemia may benefit from treatment with standard TKI therapy.

Ph-like acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) — defined as ALL with a gene-expression profile similar to Ph+ ALL — is a recently described entity in children. Now, investigators have evaluated genetic alterations in 1725 B-cell ALL patients (aged 1–39 years) and performed next-generation sequencing and evaluated response to tyrosine kinase inhibition in a subset of 154 patients with Ph-like ALL.

Results were as follows:

The frequency of Ph-like ALL increased from 10% in standard-risk childhood ALL, to 13% in high-risk childhood ALL, to 21% in adolescent ALL, to 27% in young adult ALL.
Event-free survival (EFS) and overall survival (OS) rates were lower across all age groups in patients with Ph-like versus non–Ph-like ALL.
Ph-like ALL patients had …

Reviewing Author

Michael G. Douvas, MD

Newly Defined Leukemia Responds to Tyrosine Kinase Inhibitors

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Reviewing Author