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CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 · Indian J Med Paediatr Oncol 2020; 41(05): 787-788
DOI: 10.4103/ijmpo.ijmpo_282_20
Letter to Editor

Chronic lymphocytic leukemia and Second Primary Malignancies: A Relationship Revisited

Amarendra Amar
Department of Medical Oncology, Indraprastha Apollo Hospital, New Delhi, India
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Sir,

Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), the most commonly diagnosed leukemia globally, generally affects older persons with median survival being in excess of 10 years.[1] Present-day treatment options achieve good responses, thereby improving long-term survival. However, not widely recognized is the fact that these patients may have rather an increased susceptibility to second primary malignancies (SPMs) among other issues.[2] Indeed, a 20% greater risk of occurrence of any SPM has been found in studies comparing these patients to the U. S. general population. This increased risk has been seen for both solid as well as hematological malignancies.[3] The probable causes for such observation could be genetic susceptibility, common risk factors, CLL-associated immune dysfunction, and possibly the effect of chemotherapy.



Publication History

Received: 06 June 2020

Accepted: 05 October 2020

Article published online:
17 May 2021

© 2020. Indian Society of Medical and Paediatric Oncology. This is an open access article published by Thieme under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonDerivative-NonCommercial-License, permitting copying and reproduction so long as the original work is given appropriate credit. Contents may not be used for commercial purposes, or adapted, remixed, transformed or built upon. (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/.)

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