Novel approaches to prevent leukemia relapse following allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation

Allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation is curative for patients with high-risk leukemia, but disease recurrence remains a major cause of treatment failure. New tools are now available to potentially identify patients with minimal residual disease who are at high risk for treatment failure. These improvements in disease detection allow for new opportunities to prevent relapse. The transplant course can be conceptualized into the pretransplant, peritransplant, and posttransplant periods. This article discusses the differing transplant interventions aimed at reducing relapse in each of these periods, focusing on new approaches that are currently being conceived or in early-stage clinical trials.