Acute leukemia: diagnosis, management, and potential for cure.

Acute leukemia is an uncommon malignant disorder resulting from the clonal proliferation of hematopoietic precursors of the myeloid or lymphoid lineages. Of the two major subgroups, acute lymphoblastic leukemia is more common in children, while acute myelogenous leukemia predominates in adults. With modern chemotherapy 60%-70% of all children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia can be long-term survivors and are potentially cured. Although the prognosis in acute myelogenous leukemia is less favourable, recent therapy, including bone-marrow transplantation, offers possible cure in selected patient groups.