mia patients. Chronic myeloid leukemia, or CML s probably the most well known and studied type of leukemia. According to the Leukemia Insights Newsletter CML is a cancer of the blood cells. Blood cells are produced in the bone marrow, the spongy interior of the bones. Normally, blood cells are made in an orderly, controlled way. When CML develops, the bone marrow produces large numbers of normal-appearing and normal-functioning blood cells. However, all the circulating blood cells arise from one abnormal cell and contain the Philadelphia chromosome that causes the disease. In the early stage of CML called chronic phase, the only possible complication of the disease is poor blood circulation because of too high blood cell counts. This complication can be completely prevented by controlling the blood counts with a variety of drugs (hydroxyurea, interferon, busulfan). Cure of CML is possible during chronic phase with bone marrow transplantation (BMT). This stage of CML lasts an average of 4-5 years, after which it advances to accelerated phase or blast crisis. This final phase of CML resembles an acute leukemia with increasing numbers of abnormal immature "blast" cells that crowd out the normal blood cells, and is very difficult to treat, however if treatment is admitted early, remission is possible (1,5). Especially with the great advances the medicine is making daily in cancer research.Each leukemia is different, just as individual responses to treatment are different. The newest form of treatment recently released in the article “New Leukemia Drug Gives Patients Hope” in The Herald Leader is directed toward chronic myeloid leukemia, or CML. The drug STI-571 is an experimental pill that is still in its earliest form of testing. In a study which Dr. Brian J. Dunker of the region Health Sciences University discusses in this article he states that when 31 patients were given a minimum of 300 milligrams of STI-571 a day, th...
