Edward J. Lee, MD

Ong and Larson provide an excellent review of acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) in adults. They thoroughly discuss such basic issues as the diagnosis and classification of ALL, prognostic factors, and the principles of treatment. They also discuss specific problems that arise, such as the treatment of ALL in the elderly and in those with Philadelphia chromosome-positive ALL. In addition, the authors comment on areas that do not yet have fully defined roles in treatment, such as the detection of minimal residual disease and various methods of admin-istering high-dose chemotherapy supported by allogeneic or autologous progenitor cells obtained from blood or marrow. Their views, as expressed in this paper, are reasonable and supported by appropriate references. This review will therefore expand on and underline comments made by the authors in several areas.