Читать книгу The SAGE Encyclopedia of Stem Cell Research - Группа авторов - Страница 159

Leukemia is a progressive malignant disorder marked by an increased number of immature and mature leukocytes, which in turn suppress the functions of the bone marrow and lead to pancytopenia. This pancytopenia results in anemia; as RBCs are depleted, there is a high infection rate due to the decreased leukocytes, and there are bleeding disorders due to decreased platelets.

There are four types of leukemia: acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), acute myelogenous leukemia (AML), chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), and chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML). Of these types, ALL is commonly found in children but may affect adults too.

One of the first applications for HSCs was the bone marrow transplant done to cure ALL, and over the course of the years Thomas discovered that CML, which was deemed fatal, could be cured by stem cell transplant. However, there were risks associated with this type of treatment. Now HSCs are usually acquired from the peripheral blood and are given to the patient after aggressive chemotherapy (which destroys the cancer cells) in order to reinstate the patient’s hematopoietic system, and this has yielded promising results.

In recent years, Imatinib Mesylate has been shown to target the cancer cells in CML by targeting the tyrosine kinase of the BCR-ABL gene, and it is proving to be a more suitable form of treatment over transplants due to the decreased risk of graft-versus-host disease.