Filgrastim, Cladribine, Cytarabine, and Mitoxantrone With Sorafenib in Treating Patients With Newly-Diagnosed, Acute Myeloid Leukemia or High-Risk Myelodysplastic Syndrome

Inclusion Criteria

• Age 18-60 years, inclusive
• Newly diagnosed disease with either a diagnosis of "high-risk" MDS (>= 10% blasts in marrow or blood), high-risk myeloproliferative neoplasm (MPN; >= 10% blasts in blood or bone marrow), or AML other than acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL) with t(15;17)(q22;q12) or variants according to the 2008 World Health Organization (WHO) classification. Patients with biphenotypic AML are eligible; such "high-risk" MDS or MPN have natural history much closer to AML than to lower risk MDS or MPN and have responded similarly to "AML-type" therapy.
• Outside diagnostic material is acceptable as long as peripheral blood and/or bone marrow slides are reviewed at the study institution by appropriate clinical staff. Flow cytometric analysis of peripheral blood and/or bone marrow should be performed according to institutional practice guidelines.
• Treatment-related mortality (TRM) score = 100, 000/uL, or acute symptoms can be treated with leukapheresis or may receive up to 2 doses of cytarabine (up to 500 mg/m^2/dose) prior to study day 0 enrollment
• Bilirubin = = 45%, assessed within 3 months prior to study day 0, e.g. by multi gated acquisition scan (MUGA) scan or echocardiography, or other appropriate diagnostic modality and no clinical evidence of congestive heart failure
• Women of childbearing potential and men must agree to use adequate contraception beginning at the signing of the consent until at least 3 months after the last dose of study drug
• Provide written informed consent (or legal representative)

Exclusion Criteria

• Myeloid blast crisis of chronic myeloid leukemia (CML), unless patient is not considered candidate for CML-directed tyrosine kinase inhibitor treatment (excluding sorafenib)
• Concomitant illness associated with a likely survival of < 1 year
• Active systemic fungal, bacterial, viral, or other infection, unless disease is under treatment with anti-microbials and/or controlled or stable (e.g. if specific, effective therapy is not available/feasible or desired [e.g. chronic viral hepatitis, human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)]). Patient needs to be clinically stable as defined as being afebrile and hemodynamically stable for 24-48 hours prior to study day 0, unless fever is thought to be secondary to the underlying hematologic disease.
• Active or clinically significant (or symptomatic) cardiac disease, including active coronary artery disease, cardiac arrhythmias requiring anti-arrhythmic therapy other than beta blockers or digoxin within the last 3 months, unstable angina (anginal symptoms at rest), new-onset angina within 3 months before randomization, or myocardial infarction within 6 months before study day 0
• Previous receipt of azacitidine, decitabine, anthracyclines, cytarabine, or other nucleoside analogues for treatment of AML or MPN/MDS other than as noted for cytarabine
• Pregnancy or lactation
• Concurrent treatment with any other investigational agent that has anti-leukemia activity or another drug with anti-AML-activity