Leukemia Research 2014-12-01

Salvage therapy with mitoxantrone, etoposide and cytarabine in relapsed or refractory acute lymphoblastic leukemia.

Michaela Liedtke, Tamara Dunn, Shira Dinner, Steven E Coutré, Caroline Berube, Jason Gotlib, Samit Patel, Bruno Medeiros

Index: Leuk. Res. 38(12) , 1441-5, (2014)

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Abstract

The survival of patients with relapsed or refractory acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is poor. We performed a retrospective analysis of 40 patients treated with five days of mitoxantrone 8mg/m(2)/day, etoposide 100mg/m(2)/day, and cytarabine 1000mg/m(2)/day (MEC). The complete remission rate was 30% and median remission duration was 11.2 months. Median overall survival was 6.5 months. In univariate analysis, patients in first relapse had improved overall survival compared to ≥second relapse (p=0.02). Thirty-day mortality rate was 7.5%. In relapsed or refractory ALL, MEC demonstrated moderate activity, but did not improve survival compared to published salvage chemotherapy regimens. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.