Five-year survivors among children with acute leukemia in Japan.

This Japanese nation-wide survey was carried out on long-term survivors among children with leukemia, i.e. those who had survived more than 5 years by October of 1974. Eighty-three children were surveyed. This was about 2.5 times as many as the 31 children surveyed in the first Japanese nation-wide survey in 1971. Clinical and laboratory data were also analyzed statistically and compared to that of the first survey. Most of the children had received inductive therapy according to the old protocol, but 10 children were treated with a combination of VCR and steroids. Nine of these 10 were still in a state of remission. CNS involvement occurred in 15.3% of the cases and a late onset of this complication implied a prognostic significance: among the 9 children whose complication had occurred 3.5 years after onset of the disease, 6 died. The relapse rate decreased between the 4th and 5th year after initiation of maintenance therapy. The percentage of the risk of death became zero after the 9th year.