CLL is a chronic disease so there are a lot of factors that go into a doctor’s decision as to when to begin CLL treatment.
“Knowing the tempo and history of what people’s blood counts are doing is the most important thing,” says Dr. Nicole Lamanna, a leukemia specialist at Columbia University Medical Center. She says there’s no one number that will trigger treatment. This means CLL patients are monitored and their blood count is tracked over time. The blood counts are followed because they act as a marker for how extensively the bone marrow is involved with disease. And if the marrow has significant enough involvement that may lead to CLL treatment.
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