Bullet History: Did you know?
- The word ‘leukemia’ comes from Greek ‘leukos’ and ‘hemia’ which mean “white blood”
- First diagnosed by Dr. John Hughes Benett
- In 1845, Bennett and Virchow both published papers describin an enlargement of the spleen and the presence of “purulent matter in the blood”
- Bennett and Virchow argued over who had made the discovery first, and in 1995 The Leukemia Research Fund noted Bennett as the first to discover it
- Leukemia was first called “weisses blut” which means white blood in German
- In 1872, Ernest Neuman saw leukemia in the blood marrow as well
- Alfred Donné was the first to describe leukemia; “Blood of such patients contains so many white blood cells that at first glance I thought they contained purulent matter”, he believed it was a result of “an arrest of development of intermediate cells”
- Both Pierre and Marie Curie, who researched radioactivity, showed symptoms of leukemia after exposing themselves to radiation. Marie Curie died of Leukemia.
- Marie’s daughter, Irene Joliot-Curie, also died of leukemia as she had been exposed to radioactive polonium ten years prior to her death.
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| Curie |
- Officially diagnosed in 1845
- Physicians had observed abnormally high white blood cell counts
- 1970 was when it was first confirmed there was some sort of cure for leukemia
- One of the most common early treatments for leukemia was arsenic – it was used by Hippocrates
- 18th century: Thomas Fowler comes up with a mixture of arsenic trioxide and potassium bicarbonate to use as a standard treatment for leukemia.
- Arsenic treatment fell out of favor to radiation treatment
- X-rays were found to be effective treatments but radiologists who administered and determined the strength of the treatment eventually developed leukemia
- Most adequate treatments for leukemia were determined after WWII
- Leukemia chemotherapy was developed from the chemical warfare agent, mustard gas, because it was noted that the chemicals attacked diving white blood cells and exposed soldiers exhibited low white blood cell counts
- Aminopterin, which is related to folic acid (and is found in all patients in remission), was then used as chemotherapy in the 1940s. Aminopterin prevents tumor cells from replicating their DNA.
- Researchers George Hitchings and Gertrude Elion created 6-mercaptopurin, which was the first really effective drug. It is still used in today’s therapies.
