Bone marrow exchange refers to bone marrow transplantation. Whether or not a leukemia patient needs a bone marrow transplant needs to be decided based on a combination of disease stage, progression, overall health status, and financial status. For chronic leukemia, drug therapy is generally used and bone marrow transplantation is not a first-line option. For some acute leukemias, chemotherapy followed by bone marrow transplantation is usually required.
Leukemia can be divided into chronic leukemia and acute leukemia.
1. At present, due to the continuous introduction of new targeted drugs, chronic leukemia can be treated with targeted drug therapy, chemotherapy, immunotherapy, etc., to achieve long-term survival, and bone marrow transplantation is not a first-line treatment. Drugs include imatinib, dasatinib, vincristine, and rituximab.
Bone marrow transplantation is usually used to improve the prognosis when the risk of transplantation is low and drug therapy is ineffective, as well as in patients with accelerated and acute stages; those who relapse after treatment, and those with severe disease.
2. Acute leukemia is divided into acute myeloid leukemia and acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Currently, the main treatment methods are combined chemotherapy (cytarabine) and hematopoietic stem cell transplantation.
Treatment is divided into two phases, starting with reduction of tumor load by induction chemotherapy to achieve complete remission and restore normal hematopoiesis. Further treatment after remission includes consolidation, intensification, stem cell transplantation or maintenance therapy, etc. The specific treatment plan is decided according to the clinical situation.
For leukemia patients, it is recommended to choose appropriate methods for active treatment under the guidance of a doctor to avoid delays.