Mahon F X
Laboratoire de greffe de moelle, université Victor-Segalen, UMR CNRS 5540, 146, rue Léo-Saignat, 33076 Bordeaux, France.
Rev Med Interne. 2001 Sep;22(9):894-9. doi: 10.1016/s0248-8663(01)00441-6.
Chronic myeloid leukemia is a myeloproliferative disorder clinically characterised by a triphasic course: after a chronic phase over a median time of 4 years, patients developed an accelerated phase, then a blastic phase, resulting in the patient's death with 3 to 6 months.
During the last past years, progress have been made in the understanding of the molecular mechanism responsible of leukemic growth. This has also provided support for a therapeutic improvement with the appearance of treatment such as tyrosine kinase inhibitors which specifically target the oncoprotein inside the leukemic cells.
These treatments, such as STI571 or Glivec, are at present in clinical trials, and could be the medicines for the future. Thus, chronic myeloid leukemia is also a model for the development of the new therapeutic drugs.
