Patients with chronic myeloid leukemia can be treated with tyrosine kinase inhibitors.
Patients with chronic myeloid leukemia can be treated with tyrosine kinase inhibitors. While these effective drugs lead to deep remission and prolonged survival, primitive leukemia stem cells resist elimination during the remission and persist as a major barrier to cure.
As a result, the majority of patients with chronic myeloid leukemia, or CML, require indefinite inhibitor treatment to prevent disease recurrence. They also face risks of noncompliance, toxicity and financial burden. Development of effective therapeutic strategies to improve patient outcomes for CML and related cancers depends on identifying the key mechanisms that contribute to the persistence of these leukemic stem cells.
In a study published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, Ajay Abraham, Ph.D., Shaowei Qiu, M.D., Ravi Bhatia, M.D., and colleagues at the University of Alabama at Birminghamshow how the stress-responsive protein SIRT1 plays important roles in maintaining the regenerative potential of CML leukemic stem cells and promoting leukemia development in CML.
Read more at University of Alabama at Birmingham
