37% long-term survival of children with ALL relapse by risk-stratified salvage therapy – Results of trial ALL-REZ BFM 87 after 15 years of follow-up

Cure rates of childhood ALL improved distinctly in the past decades. Nevertheless, ca. 20% of the patients relapse, and their prognosis is clearly worse. We describe design and long term results of the multicenter trial ALL-REZ BFM 87 for children with first relapse of ALL. Patients (n=207) were stratified into three risk-groups (RG, A: early bone marrow (BM) relapse, B: late BM relapse, C: isolated extramedullary relapse), alternatively, patients with a poor prognosis (very early BM relapse or any relapse of T-ALL) could be enrolled to an experimental pilot regimen (P88). Treatment consisted of multiagent chemo…