Hagop Kantarjian

Hagop Kantarjian, MD is Professor and Chairman of the Department of Leukemia at MD Anderson Cancer Center, where he has built one of the world's most productive leukemia research programs over more than three decades. He is a towering figure in adult ALL therapy, best known for developing the hyper-CVAD regimen (hyperfractionated cyclophosphamide, vincristine, doxorubicin, and dexamethasone alternating with high-dose methotrexate and cytarabine), which became a widely adopted standard for adult B-ALL and T-ALL treatment. Dr. Kantarjian has been instrumental in integrating tyrosine kinase inhibitors into the treatment of Philadelphia chromosome-positive (Ph+) ALL, pioneering the combination of imatinib and dasatinib with hyper-CVAD and subsequently demonstrating that chemotherapy-free regimens using ponatinib plus blinatumomab can produce deep molecular remissions in Ph+ ALL. He led early clinical development of inotuzumab ozogamicin (InO) for relapsed/refractory B-ALL, with the INO-VATE ALL trial results he co-published in the New England Journal of Medicine demonstrating improved remission rates and overall survival versus standard chemotherapy, leading to FDA approval. Dr. Kantarjian has authored over 2,000 peer-reviewed publications and is one of the most cited oncologists worldwide.