Dr. Gail Roboz, Professor of Medicine, Division of Hematology and Medical Oncology, WDOM, has published a paper in The New England Journal of Medicine (December 2020) that has revealed a key finding on using oral azacytidine for patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML).
It was found that patients with AML strongly benefit from taking a pill form of azacytidine as a maintenance treatment for AML based on results from an international Phase 3 clinical trial at Weill Cornell Medicine and NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital. The trial involved 472 patients from 148 medical centers around the world. Results from the trial have led to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s approval of oral azacytidine (Onureg) as a maintenance therapy for AML, which is now being used as part of standard patient care.
"At last, we have an effective treatment that can be given in the post-remission setting to help keep AML patients in remission and improve their survival,” said Dr. Gail Roboz, who served as senior author of the paper and as Principal Investigator of the trial at NYP/WCM. “We are especially gratified that the drug is very well-tolerated, so that quality of life is not compromised.”
Dr. Roboz is the Director of the Clinical and Translational Leukemia Program at Weill Cornell Medicine.