I greet the whole company! I'm glad there is such a supportive communication forum for all of us CML patients. I am Thomas from Greece aged 46 years. New patients for five months. I have started treatment with glivec. With a first quantitative pcr of 0.565 at three months. First of all I would like to wish you all good power in our struggle, God help us all!
I have a concern. Can someone answer my stupid question? Why is there this struggle to achieve more and lesser quantitative pcr? From the moment I understand the TKI do not affect so much the blasts but mainly the quantitative BCP-ABL; Could we use TKI drugs periodically? So that we have fewer side effects? That is, stopping the drug at PCR 0.565% and after rising after three months and reaching the above rate, I'll get glivec again to return to 0.565%; In short, why is the treatment aggressive in a chronic disease that is slowly progressing and not conservative? From the moment all are judged by blasts and not so much by the quantitative pcr. Cutting the medicine will give our body time to calm down, reducing side effects by increasing the quality of life for everyone. Please justify if my concern is so stupid ... I have no experience. Thank you for listening.