Trends in the treatment of childhood leukemia.

The gratifying results now being obtained in the treatment of children with acute lymphocytic leukemia has had at least two major effects on the attitude of the medical community. First, these results have encouraged physicians to think of ALL as an eminentably treatable and, perhaps, curable disease, Second, physicians have become more aware of the obligation to avoid serious side effects that might compromise the otherwise good results. My purpose in speaking to you today is to review briefly some of the results obtained, mainly at our own institution, in the treatment of this disease and to point out some of the problems that have been encountered as result of treatment. Our data has been reported in some detail recently (19) so I will present only selected points rather than an exhausive review. Some of the results I will talk about today are preliminary and will require months or years before definitive conclusions can be made.