Chemotherapy for elderly patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML) results in a median overall survival (OS) of ≤1 year. Elderly patients often present with cardiac comorbidity. Gemtuzumab ...ozogamicin (GO) is active in elderly (≥60 years) patients with relapsed AML with low cardiac toxicity.
This randomized phase II study compared a standard combination of ara-C and daunorubicin (DNR; 7+3) versus ara-C plus gemtuzumab ozogamicin (7+GO) as the first course of induction therapy. Primary objectives were comparison of blast clearance on day 16, event-free survival (EFS), and remission duration. OS, complete remission (CR), and tolerability were secondary objectives.
One hundred and nineteen patients with de novo AML, treatment-related AML, AML with a history of myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS), or high-risk MDS entered the study. Median age of 115 patients (intent-to-treat population) was 69 years. Protocol outlined a second course 7+3 for patients without blast clearance and two courses of high-dose ara-C consolidation upon CR. Both treatments were equally effective in blast clearance, CR, EFS, remission duration, or OS (median: 7+3, 9 months; 7+GO, 10 months). Induction death rate was higher in the GO group due to veno-occlusive disease.
The study did not show significant superiority of 7+GO over standard 7+3.
The value of allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation (alloHCT) as postremission treatment is not well defined for patients with intermediate-risk acute myeloid leukemia (AML) without FLT3-ITD, ...biallelic CEBPA-, or NPM1 mutations (here referred to as NPM1mut-neg/CEBPAdm-neg/FLT3-ITDneg AML) in first complete remission (CR1).
We addressed this question using data from two prospective randomized controlled trials on intensive induction- and risk-stratified postremission therapy. The NPM1mut-neg/CEBPAdm-neg/FLT3-ITDneg AML subgroup comprised 497 patients, aged 18-60 years.
In donor versus no-donor analyses, patients with a matched related donor had a longer relapse-free survival (HR 0.5; 95% CI 0.3-0.9, P = 0.02) and a trend toward better overall survival (HR 0.6, 95% CI 0.3-1.1, P = 0.08) compared with patients who received postremission chemotherapy. Notably, only 58% of patients in the donor group were transplanted in CR1. We therefore complemented the donor versus no-donor analysis with multivariable Cox regression analyses, where alloHCT was tested as a time-dependent covariate: overall survival (HR 0.58, 95% CI 0.37-0.9, P = 0.02) and relapse-free survival (HR 0.51, 95% CI 0.34-0.76; P = 0.001) for patients who received alloHCT compared with chemotherapy in CR1 were significantly longer.
Outside clinical trials, alloHCT should be the preferred postremission treatment of patients with intermediate risk NPM1mut-neg/CEBPAdm-neg/FLT3-ITDneg AML in CR1.
NCT00180115, NCT00180102.
A complex aberrant karyotype consisting of multiple unrelated cytogenetic abnormalities is associated with poor prognosis in patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML). The European Leukemia Net ...classification and the UK Medical Research Council recommendation provide prognostic categories that differ in the definition of unbalanced aberrations as well as the number of single aberrations. The aim of this study on 3526 AML patients was to redefine and validate a cutoff for karyotype complexity in AML with regard to adverse prognosis. Our study demonstrated that (1) patients with a pure hyperdiploid karyotype have an adverse risk irrespective of the number of chromosomal gains, (2) patients with translocation t(9;11)(p21∼22;q23) have an intermediate risk independent of the number of additional aberrations, (3) patients with ⩾4 abnormalities have an adverse risk per se and (4) patients with three aberrations in the absence of abnormalities of strong influence (hyperdiploid karyotype, t(9;11)(p21∼22;q23), CBF-AML, unique adverse-risk aberrations) have borderline intermediate/adverse risk with a reduced overall survival compared with patients with a normal karyotype.
Wnt signaling plays an important role in stem cell self-renewal and proliferation. Aberrant activation of Wnt signaling and its downstream targets are intimately linked with several types of cancer ...with colon cancer being the best-studied example. However, recent results also suggest an important role of Wnt signaling in normal as well as leukemic hematopoietic stem cells. Aberrant activation of Wnt signaling and downstream effectors has been demonstrated in acute myeloid leukemia. Here, mutant receptor tyrosine kinases, such as Flt3 and chimeric transcription factors such as promyelocytic leukemia-retinoic acid receptor-alpha and acute myeloid leukemia1-ETO, induce downstream Wnt signaling events. These findings suggest that the Wnt signaling pathway is an important target in several leukemogenic pathways and may provide a novel opportunity for targeting leukemic stem cells.
Monitoring minimal residual disease is an important way to identify patients with acute myeloid leukemia at high risk of relapse. In this study we investigated the prognostic potential of minimal ...residual disease monitoring by quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction analysis of NPM1 mutations in patients treated in the AMLCG 1999, 2004 and 2008 trials. Minimal residual disease was monitored - in aplasia, after induction therapy, after consolidation therapy, and during follow-up - in 588 samples from 158 patients positive for NPM1 mutations A, B and D (with a sensitivity of 10(-6)). One hundred and twenty-seven patients (80.4%) achieved complete remission after induction therapy and, of these, 56 patients (44.1%) relapsed. At each checkpoint, minimal residual disease cut-offs were calculated. After induction therapy a cut-off NPM1 mutation ratio of 0.01 was associated with a high hazard ratio of 4.26 and the highest sensitivity of 76% for the prediction of relapse. This was reflected in a cumulative incidence of relapse after 2 years of 77.8% for patients with ratios above the cut-off versus 26.4% for those with ratios below the cut-off. In the favorable subgroup according to European LeukemiaNet, the cut-off after induction therapy also separated the cohort into two prognostic groups with a cumulative incidence of relapse of 76% versus 6% after 2 years. Our data demonstrate that in addition to pre-therapeutic factors, the course of minimal residual disease in an individual is an important prognostic factor and could be included in clinical trials for the guidance of post-remission therapy. The trials from which data were obtained were registered at www.clinicaltrials.gov (#NCT01382147, #NCT00266136) and at the European Leukemia Trial Registry (#LN_AMLINT2004_230).
To evaluate the impact of patient, tumor, and treatment-related factors on outcome in unselected patients with recurrent osteosarcoma.
Five hundred seventy-six consecutive patients who had achieved a ...first complete surgical remission (CR) during combined-modality therapy on neoadjuvant Cooperative Osteosarcoma Study Group (COSS) protocols and then developed recurrent osteosarcoma were analyzed (median time from biopsy to relapse, 1.6 years; range, 0.1 to 14.3 years). There were 501 patients with metastases, 44 with local recurrences, and 31 with both. Metastases involved lungs (469 patients), bones (90 patients), and/or other sites (54 patients).
After a median follow-up of 1.2 years for all patients and 4.2 years for survivors, actuarial overall survival (OS) rates at 2, 5, and 10 years were 0.38, 0.23, and 0.18, respectively. Five-year OS was 0.39 for 339 patients with and 0.00 for 229 patients without a second surgical CR (P < .0001). A long time to relapse, a solitary lesion, and, in the case of pulmonary metastases, unilateral disease and the absence of pleural disruption, were of positive prognostic value in uni- and multivariate analyses, as were a second surgical CR and the use of second-line chemotherapy. Radiotherapy was associated with moderately prolonged survival in patients without a second CR. The very limited prognostic differences associated with the use of second-line chemotherapy appeared to be more pronounced with polychemotherapy.
Time to relapse and tumor burden correlate with postrelapse outcome in osteosarcoma. Complete surgery is an essential component of curative second-line therapy. Chemotherapy, particularly chemotherapy with more than one agent, may contribute to limited improvements in outcome.
Highlights • A type 3 is expressed on A1 erythrocytes and in NSCLC tissues of patients blood group A1. • No prognostic effect for A type 1/2 antigen. • Favorable prognostic effect of A type 3 in ...advanced NSCLC patients. • Multivariate Cox proportional hazards model confirms univariate results.