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Biotech / Medical : NVS: Novartis AG -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Valery Portnov who wrote (72)	6/29/2001 2:30:35 PM
From: RCMac	Respond to of 116

Valery, If your friend's wife was told she has no more than 3 years and that there is no "cure" for CML, the doctor may be behind the times, since Gleevec (Glivec in Europe, formerly STI-571), approved by the FDA in early may, is awfully close to a "cure" for most CML patients. See: e.g., cnn.com For other links, I suggest a full-text search on SI (not just on this thread) for "Gleevec" and "Glivec" and STI-571, which will get you a lot of discussion and other links about this drug, which has normally pessimistic and cautious oncologists restraining themselves from calling it a "cure." It does seem to cause the white blood cell count to drop to more or less normal, i.e., largely to cause remission. Oncologists are cautious folks, rightly so in light of their experience, and usually don't use the word "cure" except functionally -- free of cancer relapse for 5 years or somesuch -- and no one has been on Gleevec for more than about 18 months, so we don't know either (1) how long the medication keeps the disease at bay, or (2) the long-term side effects of taking it. It's certainly not a "cure" that eradicates the disease, and you have to keep taking the pills or the defective gene keeps stimulating the uncontrolled production of white blood cells, a process that the Gleevec interrupts. And there are some recent reports that, where Gleevec is given in the more advanced cases, the disease returns after some months of remission. But it does seem that, if the diagnosis is in fact CML, the doctor in question doesn't know about this new development, and that the patient should look for other medical advice. (This degree of apparent ignorance seems odd, in light of the huge amount of publicity Gleevec has received in the last two months -- are you sure the diagnosis is CML -- chronic myelogenous [or myeloid] leukemia? In any event, best of luck to your friend's wife in this difficult time.