The treatment of acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL) in childhood, Ukall III: The effects of added cytosine arabinoside and/or asparaginase, and a comparison of continuous or discontinuous mercaptopurine in regimens for standard risk ALL

In a comparison of treatments for standard-risk acute lymphoblastic leukaemia in children (UKALL III), there were no differences in remission lengths between regimens with or without second-line drugs (cytosine arabinoside and asparaginase) and with continuous or discontinuous mercaptopurine. The number of infections was significantly lower when maintenance followed the less immunosuppressive modified induction period and when there were 1-week gaps each month in the administration of mercaptopurine. As in the previous trial, a higher rate of relapse in boys was found to be due partly to testicular and partly to bone marrow relapse. Cell-typing by the FAB system showed that the proportion of patients still in their first remission at 5 years was very much higher in L1 than in L2 cases.