Dr. Neal Young on the Evolving Treatment for Patients Diagnosed With Aplastic Anemia
Neal Young, MD, discusses the advancement of treatment for aplastic anemia. Young said aplastic anemia used to kill almost all patients diagnosed with the disease within a year.
Neal Young, MD, chief, Intramural Research Hematology Branch, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, discusses the advancement of treatment for aplastic anemia. Young said aplastic anemia used to kill almost all patients diagnosed with the disease within a year. That patient popluar was usually older children to adults with no predisposition to the disease and a mortality rate of around 90% within a year of diagnosis.
Young says now, with immunosupression as an option for treatment, about two-thirds of patients will respond, see a rise in their blood counts and wil no longer be dependent on blood transfusions. Young adds that the response rate to therapy currently is between 80% to 90%, which he believes is due to direct stimulation of hematopoietic progenitors and hematopoietic stem cells.
