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Fifty-nine consecutive previously untreated adult patients with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) were entered onto a prospective single-arm trial of doxorubicin, vincristine, prednisone, and asparaginase (HOP-L) induction therapy followed by CNS prophylaxis and 3 years of maintenance therapy. Consolidation therapy was not administered. The study population included a large number of older (greater than 50 years) patients. Seventy-five percent of patients achieved complete remission. With a median follow-up of 6 years, the median duration of complete remission is greater than 4 years, with 53% of patients expected to remain in remission at both 3 and 5 years. Overall, median survival duration is 27.9 months, with 45% and 35% of all patients expected to survive 3 and 5 years, respectively. Multivariate analysis identified patients with T-cell disease and mediastinal masses (P less than .001) and those with low values of lactic dehydrogenase (LDH) (P = .057) as being at greatest risk of relapse. Therapy was well tolerated by patients under age 35, but older patients suffered appreciable mortality. We conclude that this treatment program is effective therapy for adult ALL, yielding a large proportion of durable remissions despite the exclusion of consolidation therapy.
Radford et al. (Sun,) studied this question.