Day Two ASH 2017 Atlanta, Georgia on CLL (chronic lymphocytic leukemia)

The snow has stopped and the sidewalks and streets are less snowy but more treacherous with ice. Ubers and buses are running and the meeting goes on.

It was a long second day at ASH, with two important clinical oral presentations, CLL-related poster clinical and pre-clinical abstracts and more interviews at ASH (American Society of Hematology) 2017 Annual Meeting in Atlanta Georgia.

Today we got into juicy clinical chronic lymphocytic leukemia sessions on new combinations of drugs such as ibrutinib and venetoclax, or venetoclax and antibodies.

Also there was more on the clinical importance and the increased ability to achieve MRD (minimal residual disease) negative disease where there are no CLL cells found within a sample of 10,000 lymphocytes.

And there was some controversy on the advisability of stopping therapy or continuing treatment.

This is all amazingly positive if not revolutionary news as we are moving the CLL treatment paradigm in the direction of combo therapies (often with no chemo) and limited duration of treatment.

Watch the video below or read the transcript here.

Details to follow.

Brian Koffman, MD 12-11-17