Blinatumomab Improves Event-Free Survival in Children With High-Risk B-Cell ALL

TUESDAY, Sept. 22, 2026 (HealthDay News) — Blinatumomab is associated with significantly higher event-free survival among children with newly diagnosed high-risk B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), according to a study published in the Sept. 17 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

Martin Schrappe, M.D., from the Christian Albrechts University Kiel in Germany, and colleagues randomly assigned children with newly diagnosed high-risk B-cell ALL to receive two cycles of blinatumomab (blinatumomab group) or two cycles of chemotherapy (control group) after consolidation (358 and 351 children, respectively).

The researchers found the estimated four-year event-free survival was 83.0 and 70.3 percent in the blinatumomab and control groups, respectively, at a planned interim analysis with a median follow-up of 2.9 years. For a primary end-point event, the estimated hazard ratio was 0.51 for blinatumomab versus control. Overall, 23.9 and 69.4 percent of patients in the blinatumomab and control groups, respectively, had infection related to the trial treatment. Life-threatening adverse events occurred in 0.5 and 4.7 percent of patients in the blinatumomab group and in the control group, respectively, including one (in 0.3 percent) that was fatal in the blinatumomab group.

“The excellent outcomes observed in the current trial beg the question of whether integration of blinatumomab obviates the need for transplantation in some or all these high-risk patients,” Regina M. Myers, M.D., and Stephen P. Hunger, M.D., from the Children”s Hospital of Philadelphia, write in an accompanying editorial.

Several authors disclosed ties to the biopharmaceutical industry.

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