Children's Cancer Group (CCG) initiatives in childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia

Childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is the single most common malignancy in children([1]) and its incidence is increasing.([2]) Despite the signal progress to date,([3]) the absolute number of children with ALL who have relapses still exceeds the number of children with newly diagnosed acute myeloid leukemia, medulloblastoma and osteosarcoma. In the Children's Cancer Group (CCG) experience, approximately one-half of relapses still derive from the two-thirds of patients with favorable presenting features and one-half of relapses from the one-third of patients with unfavorable presenting features. Childhood ALL continues to contribute greatly to the overall morbidity and mortality of childhood cancer.