Leukemia is a cancer of the blood that develops in the bone marrow. Leukemia causes bone marrow to make white blood cells that don’t work right.

These cells grow and divide without dying, taking over the healthy bone marrow. They block out healthy cells from growing, causing symptoms of leukemia. These include infections, anemia and bleeding.

Leukemia has a few different forms, including:

• Acute myeloid or myelogenous leukemia (AML): A fast-growing blood cancer. The bone marrow makes abnormal myeloid cells.
• Acute lymphocytic or lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL): A fast-growing cancer that starts in the bone marrow. It affects lymphoid white blood cells.
• Chronic myeloid leukemia (CML): A slow-growing blood cancer. It starts when the bone marrow makes too many myeloid white blood cells.

Leukemia Versus Lymphoma

You may get leukemia confused with another blood cancer, lymphoma. These are both cancers, and both involve white blood cells.

• Leukemia is a cancer of the blood and bone marrow. The body makes lots of abnormal white blood cells in the bone marrow, which are then released into the blood.
• Lymphoma is a cancer of the lymphatic system. The body makes lots of abnormal white blood cells in the lymph nodes.

Your cancer team will tailor a care plan to your child. They’ll consider your child's age, health, medical history and unique type of leukemia. The care plan may also change based on how your child responds to treatments.

Some of the most common treatments we use to fight cancer include:

• Chemotherapy: Drugs that kill fast-growing cells, like cancer. Most kids with leukemia will get this treatment.
• Radiation: High-energy rays that damage cancer cells. Less commonly used.
• Bone marrow transplant: Replaces cancerous bone marrow with healthy stem cells. We may use this if leukemia does not respond to other types of care.
• Immunotherapy: Drugs that help your body's immune system fight cancer. We use it to treat relapsed or hard-to-treat leukemia.
• Cellular therapy: We can give kids with certain types of leukemia a newer treatment called Kymriah (tisagenlecleucel). This cellular therapy is FDA-approved for B-cell acute ALL. It uses your child’s T cells to target leukemia cells.

While getting cancer treatment, your child may also need:

• Medicine for side effects like nausea, or to protect healthy organs.
• Transfusions of red blood cells and/or platelets.
• Antibiotics to treat or prevent infections.

After your child's cancer treatment is over, they’ll still have many regular visits for routine follow-up care. We'll monitor their recovery, make sure the cancer isn’t coming back and provide education on healthy living as a cancer survivor.

The MACC Fund Center also offers support groups for patients and families. There are groups for every stage of the cancer journey — from diagnosis to survivorship.

At Children’s Wisconsin, we support kids with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) and their families at the Comprehensive Leukemia Center.

We bring together experts of all types of care in a single clinic visit. We address not only the cancer itself but also your child’s overall health and well-being.

Trying to plan visits with all of these experts can be daunting. It’s one of the main reasons we created the clinic. We aim to ease this burden for both the patient and their family.

Kids with ALL see many experts at our clinic in a single visit. The expert team tailors a care plan to your child. We assess, monitor and treat the effects of cancer on their whole health.

During a clinic visit, a child will typically see a:

• Leukemia expert
• Physical therapist
• Neuropsychologist
• Dietician
• Social worker
• Child-family life specialist
• Dentistry

We address the physical effects of cancer therapy. But we also work to improve quality of life by addressing fatigue, stress and anxiety.

Your child and family benefit from our clinic in several ways:

• Our highly trained experts can spot problems before they progress.
• Our experts work with your family to create a care plan together.
• A single visit means you spend less time at doctors' visits.

You’ll have your first clinic visit two months after diagnosis. You come back at six months and 12 months. After the first year, you’ll have annual visits until your child moves into our survivorship program.