Leukemia (CLL)

Chronic lymphocytic leukemia, or CLL, is the most common type of leukemia in the United States and Europe, mostly affecting people over 55.  CLL affects patients in different ways: Some can live with the disease for decades, while it can progress very quickly in others. This makes treating CLL a challenge.

The last 10-15 years have seen dramatic advances in treatment outcomes for thousands of patients with CLL, as new drugs have been developed that target CLL cancer cells with fewer side effects.

MD Anderson’s CLL Moon Shot will combine the latest treatment technology and genetic knowledge to identify the most promising new treatments and move them into a clinical setting in a faster, more efficient way.

Our Approach

Previous

  • Goals

    Blood Draw room in the leukemia clinicMD Anderson is poised to make dramatic advances in the treatment of CLL within the first three years of the Moon Shot Program.  Several early-stage clinical trials of new drugs and combination therapies are yielding exciting results.

    Our goals are to:

    • Replace traditional chemotherapy drugs as the front-line treatment of CLL
    • Improve the one-year survival rate of all CLL patients after starting treatment
    • Increase the number of patients who are disease-free after 10 years, from  35% to 75%
    • Demonstrate that re-educating the patient’s own immune system to fight CLL is an effective treatment modality
    • Discover new immunotherapy treatments that minimize toxic effects of standard chemotherapy

  • Research

    Research - Personalized TherapyThere are several promising avenues of research for CLL. Harnessing the body’s own immune system to fight CLL instead of just killing cancer cells and using new and existing drugs in different combinations are actively being pursued at MD Anderson.

    Our research goals include:

    • Creating a CLL “gene map” that can help determine disease risk factors and enable us to predict how the disease will affect each patient
    • Looking at new drug combinations with the goal of personalizing therapy to a patient’s specific diagnosis
    • Developing CLL screening tests using blood, plasma and serum markers
    • Learning to overcome p53 and ATM dysfunction of CLL by addressing the resistance mechanisms of these abnormalities
     .

     

  • Infrastructure

    Our team developed the current standard of care for CLL, a combination of chemotherapy and a targeted antibody-based treatment.

    MD Anderson is home to the nation’s largest CLL tissue repository, which has provided a wealth of data for research.  However, we can improve our methods for sharing this data in a timely manner. We will help achieve this goal by enhancing the collection of specimens coupled with carefully annotated clinical data from all CLL patients to build our knowledge of the disease.  It will create a collaborative dynamic that allows MD Anderson to share data and tissue specimens with other institutions and allow for analysis of data from a variety of systems in near-real-time.

  • Platform

    Our team developed the current standard of care for CLL, a combination of chemotherapy and a targeted antibody-based treatment.

    MD Anderson is home to the nation’s largest CLL tissue repository, which has provided a wealth of data for research.  However, we can improve our methods for sharing this data in a timely manner. Our CLL “discovery model” will help achieve this goal by enhancing the collection of specimens coupled with carefully annotated clinical data from all CLL patients to build our knowledge of the disease.  It will create a collaborative dynamic that allows MD Anderson to share data and tissue specimens with other institutions and allow for analysis of data from a variety of systems in near-real-time.

  • Goals

    Blood Draw room in the leukemia clinicMD Anderson is poised to make dramatic advances in the treatment of CLL within the first three years of the Moon Shot Program.  Several early-stage clinical trials of new drugs and combination therapies are yielding exciting results.

    Our goals are to:

    • Replace traditional chemotherapy drugs as the front-line treatment of CLL
    • Improve the one-year survival rate of all CLL patients after starting treatment
    • Increase the number of patients who are disease-free after 10 years, from  35% to 75%
    • Demonstrate that re-educating the patient’s own immune system to fight CLL is an effective treatment modality
    • Discover new immunotherapy treatments that minimize toxic effects of standard chemotherapy

  • Research

    Research - Personalized TherapyThere are several promising avenues of research for CLL. Harnessing the body’s own immune system to fight CLL instead of just killing cancer cells and using new and existing drugs in different combinations are actively being pursued at MD Anderson.

    Our research goals include:

    • Creating a CLL “gene map” that can help determine disease risk factors and enable us to predict how the disease will affect each patient
    • Looking at new drug combinations with the goal of personalizing therapy to a patient’s specific diagnosis
    • Developing CLL screening tests using blood, plasma and serum markers
    • Learning to overcome p53 and ATM dysfunction of CLL by addressing the resistance mechanisms of these abnormalities
     .

     

  • Infrastructure

    Our team developed the current standard of care for CLL, a combination of chemotherapy and a targeted antibody-based treatment.

    MD Anderson is home to the nation’s largest CLL tissue repository, which has provided a wealth of data for research.  However, we can improve our methods for sharing this data in a timely manner. We will help achieve this goal by enhancing the collection of specimens coupled with carefully annotated clinical data from all CLL patients to build our knowledge of the disease.  It will create a collaborative dynamic that allows MD Anderson to share data and tissue specimens with other institutions and allow for analysis of data from a variety of systems in near-real-time.

  • Platform

    Our team developed the current standard of care for CLL, a combination of chemotherapy and a targeted antibody-based treatment.

    MD Anderson is home to the nation’s largest CLL tissue repository, which has provided a wealth of data for research.  However, we can improve our methods for sharing this data in a timely manner. Our CLL “discovery model” will help achieve this goal by enhancing the collection of specimens coupled with carefully annotated clinical data from all CLL patients to build our knowledge of the disease.  It will create a collaborative dynamic that allows MD Anderson to share data and tissue specimens with other institutions and allow for analysis of data from a variety of systems in near-real-time.

Next

Our Team

The Moon Shot leaders are charged with galvanizing the large and integrated team that will move forward in a milestone-driven manner to convert scientific knowledge into drugs, tests, devices and policies that can benefit patients as quickly as possible.

  • Michael Keating, M.D.

    Michael Keating, M.D.

    Professor, Leukemia
  • plunkitt

    William Plunkett, Ph.D.

    Professor, Experimental Therapeutics
  • Michael Keating, M.D.

    Michael Keating, M.D.

    Professor, Leukemia

  • plunkitt

    William Plunkett, Ph.D.

    Professor, Experimental Therapeutics

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Our Stories

These MD Anderson patients are surviving and thriving after their CLL diagnosis. What we have learned from their cancer journeys provides the launch platform for the CLL Moon Shot.

  • Vittorio Alliata di Montereale

    Vittorio Alliata di Montereale

    CLL

    Vittorio Alliata di Montereale was living in Los Angeles when he was diagnosed with CLL in April 1999. He came to MD Anderson after learning that Michael Keating, M.D., was “the best in the world for treating CLL.” When he met Keating, professor in the Leukemia department, Alliata was advised that he didn’t need therapy right away. Keating recommended careful monitoring, explaining that CLL usually progresses slowly and that a more effective combination of drugs was on the horizon. “He told me there probably were hundreds of things I could worry about that might kill me, but that list did not include CLL. Then he gave us a big bear hug,” Alliata remembers fondly. By the time he celebrated his 50th birthday in 2006, Alliata began seriously training for a triathlon. He placed first in his age group in three local competitions, and then qualified for national and world championships. Read the full story…

  • Vittorio Alliata di Montereale

    Vittorio Alliata di Montereale

    CLL

    Vittorio Alliata di Montereale was living in Los Angeles when he was diagnosed with CLL in April 1999. He came to MD Anderson after learning that Michael Keating, M.D., was “the best in the world for treating CLL.” When he met Keating, professor in the Leukemia department, Alliata was advised that he didn’t need therapy right away. Keating recommended careful monitoring, explaining that CLL usually progresses slowly and that a more effective combination of drugs was on the horizon. “He told me there probably were hundreds of things I could worry about that might kill me, but that list did not include CLL. Then he gave us a big bear hug,” Alliata remembers fondly. By the time he celebrated his 50th birthday in 2006, Alliata began seriously training for a triathlon. He placed first in his age group in three local competitions, and then qualified for national and world championships. Read the full story…

Leukemia (CLL) Resources

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