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ACUTE MYELOID LEUKEMIA

Evidence supporting that the attribution of first success in use of arsenic for the treatment of leukaemia should be to David Lissauer (1836–1892)

Leukemia volume 36, pages 1697–1698 (2022)Cite this article

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After the early descriptions of leukemia, notably by Velpeau (1827), Donné (1844), Bennett (1845) and Virchow (1845) (reviewed in [1,2,3]), in 1865 Lissauer (Kassel Landkrankenhaus, Germany) reported the first therapeutic success, albeit incomplete and temporary [4]. A 32 year-old woman, probably suffering from chronic myeloid leukemia, whom Lissauer treated with Fowler’s solution—an alkaline preparation of arsenic trioxide (ATO) and tincture of lavender [5]—recovered sufficiently to leave hospital, although without continued treatment she subsequently relapsed. ATO then became established as a treatment for leukemia for about 40 years until it was gradually superseded, firstly by splenic irradiation with X-rays, then by cytotoxic chemotherapies and, as the underlying pathophysiologies and molecular lesions of hematological malignancies were identified, by drugs targeted toward the dysregulated proteins [6, 7]. However, the use of ATO in combination with all-trans retinoic acid remains standard of care for the treatment of acute promyelocytic leukemia [8, 9] and ATO combinations continue to be evaluated in preclinical studies and leukemia trials (https://www.clinicaltrials.gov), such that the original 1865 publication by Lissauer [4] is frequently cited.

It is not simple to unambiguously identify the true author of Lissauer’s seminal publication because neither the first name nor initial are given in the 1865 publication, and unfortunately nearly all of the literature that refers to his use of ATO wrongly attributes the innovation to either Abraham M. Lissauer (1832–1908) or to his son Heinrich Lissauer (1861–1891), who were eminent physicians in their own rights. However, the full identity of the author can be established from information gleaned from the publication and other articles as Dr David Lissauer.

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  1. Novartis Institutes for Biomedical Research, 4002, Basel, Switzerland

    Paul W. Manley

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PWM researched and authored this article.

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PWM is an employee of Novartis Pharma AG, Basel, Switzerland.

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Manley, P.W. Evidence supporting that the attribution of first success in use of arsenic for the treatment of leukaemia should be to David Lissauer (1836–1892). Leukemia 36, 1697–1698 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41375-022-01608-y

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