Recent advances in the treatment of follicular lymphoma.

The success of anti-CD20 monoclonal antibody therapy for follicular lymphoma has encouraged efforts to identify new target molecules, and a new generation of more potent antibodies is now being developed, targeting either CD20 or other molecules. At the same time, other agents that were developed to treat other kinds of malignancies have turned out to be effective against this disease. In both treatment approaches, using either antibodies or chemical compounds, data on such trials are accumulating. In this mini-review these agents are introduced, and it is noted that clinical trials of these new agents are also ongoing in Japan.