The Clinical Observation on Arsenic Trioxide with ATRA in Treating Acute Promyelocytic Leukemia for Six Years.

Objective: To observe the efficacy of arsenic trioxide(AS2O3) with ATRT for the treatment of patients with acute promyelocytic leukemia(APL).

Methods: Seventy-four patients with APL, from 2000 to 2006, were randomly divided into two groups. Thirty-eight patients as treating group received AS2O3+ATRA, another thirty-six patients as control group were treated only AS2O3+ARTA+chemotherapy(DA or HA).

Results: The first induced complete remission (CR) was 100%, the three-year relapse rate was 2.6%, the six-year continuous complete remission(CCR) rate was 94.6% for treating group. The rate of CR, the three-year relapse and CCR were 81.3%, 30.7% and 61.5% respectively for control group. The side effects such as myelosuppression, severe infection or septicemia, hepatic, renal and myocardial damage, and the digestive tract side effect were mild compared with that in control group(p<0.01). In treating group, the hyperleukocytosis was not observed, Incidence of the three-year treatment-related mortality (TRM) was 0%, the control group was 16.7%.

Conclusion: The combination of AS2O3 and ATRA can obtain a higher CCR, low relapse rate and mild treatment side effects.