• Thomas Elter, Michael Hallek, and Andreas Engert.
• First Department of Internal Medicine, University of Cologne, Joseph-Stelzmann-Str. 9, 50924 Cologne, Germany. thomas.elter@uk-koeln.de
• Expert Opin Pharmacother. 2006 Aug 1; 7 (12): 1641-51.

AbstractChronic lymphocytic leukaemia (CLL) is the most common leukaemia in the Western world. Historically, CLL patients have received prednisone- or chlorambucil-containing regimens, resulting in modest responses and a slim chance of long-term survival. The addition of purine nucleoside analogues, specifically fludarabine, to the armamentarium has significantly improved efficacy in treatment-naive or heavily pretreated CLL patients. Since the 1980s, fludarabine monotherapy has demonstrated an improvement in response over historical chemotherapeutic agents. Single-agent fludarabine therapy has expanded into a combination regimen containing cyclophosphamide and has further evolved to incorporate monoclonal antibodies. A review of the fludarabine literature shows that these advancements in fludarabine-containing therapy have enhanced the overall patient response with a potential increase in survival time, thus representing progress towards a superior treatment for CLL.

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