Genetic cause of childhood leukemia identified
"We’re in uncharted territory," said study author Kenneth Offit, MD, MPH, Chief of the Clinical Genetics Service at Memorial Sloan-Kettering. "At the very least this discovery gives us a new window into inherited causes of childhood leukemia. More immediately, testing for this mutation may allow affected families to prevent leukemia in future generations." The mutation was first observed in a family treated at Memorial Sloan-Kettering of which several family members of different generations had been diagnosed with childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). A second, non-related, leukemia-prone family cared for at a different hospital was later found to have the same mutation…