In the past decade, the treatment of chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) has undergone a drastic evolution. The discovery and success of imatinib and second-generation tyrosine kinase inhibitors have substantially increased the outcome for CML patients. The next step in medical and scientific research is to better understand the malignancy so as to eventually find a cure to eliminate all leukemic cells from patients. One of the key issues is about the resistance of the leukemic stem cells to tyrosine kinase inhibitors. Here, we briefly describe our current studies on CML resistance, and leukemic stem cell modeling and characterization.
Keywords: chronic myeloid leukemia; leukemic stem cells; resistance to treatment; tyrosine kinase inhibitors.
Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.