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Hematology advances. With great strides. And it draws the present, but above all the future, of the challenge to diseases such as leukemia, lymphomas and myeloma. This is confirmed by Sergio Amadori, Hematologist and President of AIl (Italian Association against Leukemia, Lymphomas and Myeloma), which has always been committed to supporting science and helping the sick, thanks to the work of thousands of volunteers throughout Italy. Even in the time of Covid 19, the Italian specialists managed to ensure that patients with blood cancer did not contract the disease more than normal subjects and neither the severity and mortality were different. Even in terms of assistance, it can be said that the treatments, despite many difficulties, continued and no patient was left alone. However, a solid relationship between doctor and patient is fundamental.
The specialist becomes a “tailor”
Hematology is increasingly being proposed as an innovative discipline thanks to the increased knowledge in the biological and molecular fields and the possibility of being able to “adapt” as a tailor tailor-made therapies for each patient. In the field of lymphomas, the various experts are continuing the advancement of treatments and consequently also the improvement of prognosis and survival, in some cases truly remarkable, in lymphomas and chronic lymphatic leukemia. This is thanks above all to the modern ones immunological therapies, which will be joined more and more in the future by i CAR-T treatments. Even the most complex diseases, the most difficult lymphomas such as indolent lymphomas and aggressive lymphomas, benefit from these advances and the future is more and more Chemo-free.
For the myeloproliferative neoplasms there have been important advances in diagnosis and therapy, with increasingly precise and personalized definitions in terms of risk stratification based on prognostic models of therapy with numerous drugs that have just entered clinical use and with others that are emerging as evidence of a truly remarkable experimental ferment.
In myeloid leukemia chronic treatment opportunities continue to grow thanks to new tyrosine kinase inhibitor molecules that can be used in the second and third line. Patients who reach a profound molecular response are more and more and consequently survival also expands to the point of talking about the suspension of therapy and therefore a return to a completely normal life.
In the sector of multiple myeloma we are witnessing a great therapeutic ferment: many new and powerful drugs are already in use and others are about to arrive. It must always be remembered that this pathology is characterized by different manifestations and severities, with the need to accurately design the therapies, case by case.
Precisely on the front of therapies, also in the logic of an optimal control of the manifestations related to the treatments, a future full of perspectives is being designed even in complex pathologies such as acute leukemias eland myelodysplastic syndromes. But it is necessary to remember the importance of the “all-round” well-being of the patient, which goes beyond pathology and treatment. In this sense, the recommendation is to associate psychological counseling with specific therapies for the disease, in agreement with the specialist who can propose this opportunity in the most advanced and reference teams.
AIL’s commitment, always at the forefront
“AIL, in addition to providing assistance to haematological patients, supports scientific research whose progress has led in the last twenty years to an extraordinary advancement in therapies for haematological neoplasms, for which the percentages of curability and healing have more than tripled compared thirty years ago ”says the Prof. Amadori. For some years now the so-called “precision medicine” has been established which, through the knowledge of the pathogenetic mechanisms of blood cancers, allows treatments to be personalized with precision therapies. All this took place thanks to world scientific research, which is also very active in Italy with the Cooperator Group GIMEMA, born from an enlightened idea of prof. Franco Mandelli who decided many years ago to create a network of all the consortiumed Italian blood centers to develop clinical research programs. GIMEMA has been at the forefront for years in the production of clinical studies, some of which have represented a turning point in the treatment of some forms of blood cancers. The GIMEMA Group is currently involved in a very high number of ongoing clinical trials on acute leukemia, chronic leukemia and myelodysplasia, areas in which it is recognized as one of the most important clinical research groups in the world. AIL continues its commitment in support of Research by implementing various fundraising initiatives to be allocated to GIMEMA and is proud to do so so that scientific progress can follow one another more and more rapidly “.
In collaboration with GSK
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