[Prognosis of chronic myeloid leukemia]

The prognosis of chronic myelocytic leukemia is a current topic owing to the new treatments that have been proposed for this malignant blood disease which, a few years ago, was lethal within 3 to 4 years due to the inescapable occurrence of the terminal acute transformation. Beside bone marrow allograft, which is known to have cured a non-negligible number of patients, the most recent use of interferons offers a reasonable therapeutic alternative to those patients who cannot be allografted. The identification of prognostic variables at the time of diagnosis has become necessary for a better determination of therapeutic indications. The analysis of large published series has made it possible to construct mathematical models which have proved efficient and have been confirmed by prospective studies. The value of new techniques, such as molecular biology, to refine the mathematical models remains to be demonstrated.