A Small Fact About Vincristine
I looked something up this week.
The chemotherapy drug my son was given during induction, and then again during consolidation, and then again on a scheduled rotation for most of his treatment, is called vincristine.
Vincristine was FDA approved in July 1963.
Vincristine was approved for use in children before I was born.
The drug my son was given, hundreds of times, into his port, over three and a half years, is the same drug that pediatric oncologists gave children in 1963.
I want to sit with that.
It is not a criticism of the drug. Vincristine has saved hundreds of thousands of children with leukemia. It is one of the reasons the survival rate for standard-risk pediatric ALL is now around 90 percent. In 1963 that number was almost zero.
The reason I want to sit with it is different. I want to sit with the fact that the medical world, in 2026, is still using a drug from 1963 as the backbone of pediatric leukemia treatment. Because we haven't invested enough in the research that would give us something better.
My son is off treatment now. He is fine. He is starting kindergarten this week.
The next child, though, sitting in an infusion chair somewhere this morning, is being given a drug that is 63 years old.
I am writing this down on a Friday, quietly, and moving on with my day. But I wanted to write it down.
Dina
Mom of Max | Founder, Maxwell’s Toy Shoppe
Childhood Cancer Advocate 💛
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