Treatment by stage Treatment for childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia depends on the prognostic group to which your child is assigned based primarily on your child's age and white blood cell count at diagnosis. Your child may receive treatment that is considered standard based on its effectiveness in a number of patients in past studies, or you may choose to have your child take part in a clinical trial. Not all patients are cured with standard therapy and some standard treatments may have more side effects than are desired. For these reasons, clinical trials are designed to test new treatments and to find better ways to treat cancer patients. Untreated childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia Your child's treatment will probably be remission induction chemotherapy to kill cancer cells and cause the leukemia to go into remission.
Induction chemotherapy is almost always successful in inducing remission.
Clinical trials are testing new ways of inducing remission. Childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia in remission Your child's treatment will probably be intensive chemotherapy to kill any remaining cancer cells. Following intensification therapy, chemotherapy generally continues until the child has been in continuous remission for several years. Recurrent childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia Treatment depends on the type of treatment your child received before, how soon the cancer came back following treatment, and whether the leukemia cells are found outside the bone marrow. Your child's treatment will probably be systemic or intrathecal chemotherapy, radiation therapy, or bone marrow transplantation.