Treatment and Prevention
If chronic lymphocytic leukemia isn't at an advanced stage, your doctor may decide treatment is unnecessary at that point, and instead recommend "watchful waiting" and tracking the condition through regular blood testing. Treatment may not be needed for years, and then only if the number of lymphocytes increases, the lymph nodes enlarge, or the number of red blood cells or platelets decreases.
Chemotherapy may be used to treat some of the symptoms of chronic lymphocytic leukemia, such as fatigue, anemia, or enlarged lymph nodes. It may be necessary to receive blood or platelet transfusions, depending on the person's blood tests. Radiation is occasionally used to treat excessive lymph node enlargement.
If anemia develops, it's treated with blood transfusions and injections of epoetin* (a medication that stimulates red blood cell formation). Low platelet counts are treated with platelet transfusions, and infections with antibiotics. Sometimes the anemia or low platelet count is due to "autoimmune" effects, where the body's immune system attacks these blood components. This complication is often treated with high doses of steroids, intravenous gammaglobulins (a type of protein in the blood), and possibly surgical removal of the spleen.
Sometimes the spleen may be removed (splenectomy) if it has become very large and uncomfortable, or causes anemia as blood flows through it.
Over-treatment of leukemia with certain medications is actually more dangerous than under-treatment because they may cause severe side effects and don't cure the disease or allow people to live longer. Anticancer medications may be prescribed on their own or in combination with corticosteroids, such as prednisone, when the number of lymphocytes becomes very high. Corticosteroids can cause dramatic improvement in people with advanced leukemia. However, this improvement doesn't usually last long, and long-term use of corticosteroids can produce many negative effects, including an increased risk of getting severe infections.
New medications and new combinations of medications are currently being tested that may lead to better, more effective treatments for chronic lymphocytic leukemia, and new procedures for bone marrow transplants are also being studied.
Those who receive bone marrow transplants must take medications that suppress the body's immune system so that their bodies don't reject the new marrow. However, these medications also put the person at a much greater risk of infection, and ways to reduce this risk are under research.
Immunotherapy, which enhances the body's natural disease defenses, is a new area of research that shows promise. A variety of different treatments are being studied to boost the body's ability to prevent the growth and survival of leukemia cells.
Cytokines are another promising area of research. Cytokines are chemicals produced by the body to help cells communicate with each other. Researchers are looking for ways to make artificial cytokines that could help the immune system attack the leukemia cells.
As far as we know, there is nothing that can be done to prevent chronic lymphocytic leukemia. Early diagnosis and treatment is key to stopping the condition from getting worse.
*All medications have both common (generic) and brand names. The brand name
is what a specific manufacturer calls the product (e.g., Tylenol®).
The common name is the medical name for the medication (e.g., acetaminophen).
A medication may have many brand names, but only one common name. This article
lists medications by their common names. For more information on brand names,
speak with your doctor or pharmacist.