Bayesian network meta-analysis comparing five contemporary treatment strategies for newly diagnosed acute promyelocytic leukaemia

Acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL) is a curable subtype of acute myeloid leukemia. The optimum regimen for newly diagnosed APL remains inconclusive. In this Bayesian network meta-analysis, we compared the effectiveness of five regimens-arsenic trioxide (ATO) + all-trans retinoic acid (ATRA), realgar-indigo naturalis formula (RIF) which contains arsenic tetrasulfide + ATRA, ATRA + anthracycline-based chemotherapy (CT), ATO alone and ATRA alone, based on fourteen randomized controlled trials (RCTs), which included 1407 newly diagnosed APL patients. According to the results, the ranking efficacy of the treatment, including early death and complete remission in the induction stage, was the following: 1. ATO/RIF + ATRA; 2. ATRA + CT; 3. ATO, and 4. ATRA. For long-term benefit, ATO/RIF + ATRA significantly improved overall survival (OS) (hazard ratio = 0.35, 95%CI 0.15–0.82, p = 0.02) and event-free survival (EFS) (hazard ratio = 0.32, 95%CI 0.16–0.61, p = 0.001) over ATRA + CT regimen for the low-to-intermediate-risk patients. Thus, ATO + ATRA and RIF + ATRA might be considered the optimum treatments for the newly diagnosed APL and should be recommended as the standard care for frontline therapy.