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ABL-specific tyrosine kinase inhibitor imatinib as salvage therapy in a child with Philadelphia chromosome-positive acute mixed lineage leukemia (AMLL)

Leukemia volume 16, pages 1393–1395 (2002)Cite this article

The translocation t(9;22) is present in 3 to 5% of children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) and in less than 1% of children with acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Besides ALL and AML, there is a rare third subtype of acute leukemias, AMLL, defined as immunologically biphenotypic leukemia, leukemia with morphological evidence of two distinct blast populations or with lineage switch.1,2,3 While accounting for less than 1% of all leukemias in German children, AMLL has a Philadelphia chromosome-positive (Ph+) rate of 10% in the Berlin–Frankfurt–Münster (BFM)-AML trials,3 the highest rate among all pediatric acute leukemias.

Ph+ acute leukemias have a markedly poorer prognosis than most other acute leukemias in children.4 This is especially true for the rare AMLL.5 One major problem is the significantly lower complete remission (CR) rate of Ph+ acute leukemias which is the first prerequisite for successful therapy.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Pediatric Oncology and Hematology, University of Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany

    B Selle, C Bär, S Hecker & U Schmidt-Rohr

  2. Department of Pediatric Oncology and Hematology, University of Giessen, Giessen, Germany

    S Viehmann

  3. Department of Pediatric Oncology and Hematology, University of Ulm, Ulm, Germany

    K-M Debatin

  4. Department of Pediatric Oncology and Hematology, University of Münster, Münster, Germany

    D Reinhardt

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  1. B Selle
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  2. C Bär
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  3. S Hecker
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  7. D Reinhardt
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Selle, B., Bär, C., Hecker, S. et al. ABL-specific tyrosine kinase inhibitor imatinib as salvage therapy in a child with Philadelphia chromosome-positive acute mixed lineage leukemia (AMLL). Leukemia 16, 1393–1395 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.leu.2402520

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