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Continuation
CML Expert Commentaries on IM Therapy Monitoring
Jorge Cortes (contd):
It is also important to have a baseline value for the Bcr-Abl/Abl ratio for follow-up during therapy as the rate of decline may be important to define response and the increase back to pretreatment levels to define resistance. The need for follow-up assessment of the Bcr-Abl/Abl percentage ratio cannot be emphasized enough. Even when there is still heterogeneity in the form in which the test is performed in different laboratories, some assessment of the response of each patient should be mandatory."
Dr. Cortes places a lot of importance on cytogenetic analysis at diagnosis.
Michele Baccarani, MD (Italy):
"I agree with the proposed criteria for the definition of the response and loss of the response, as well as the guidelines for monitoring the response itself as presented by Goldman and colleagues.
However, I would place emphasis not only on molecular biology, but also on conventional and fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) cytogenetics, which are required to identify the appearance of other genomic abnormalities."
Dr. Baccarani proposes all three testing procedures be used for monitoring of CML patients on IM.
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