The study aims to lessen the monetary burden on patients and society by decreasing the price of proprietary drugs used in leukemia therapy. Flow cytometry, reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction, western blot, and a patient-derived xenograft mouse model were used to confirm the therapeutic effect of Pinellia ternata extract on leukemia. Three types of leukemia cells (K562, HL-60, and C8166 cell lines) were found to undergo early apoptosis (P <= .05) after being exposed to P. ternata extract, as measured by flow cytometry. Reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction results showed that P. ternata extract at both middle (300 mu g/mL) and high (500 mu g/mL) concentrations was able to down-regulate Bcl-2 and upregulate mRNA expression of Bax and caspase-3. In the patient-derived xenograft mouse model formed by BALB/c-nu/nu nude mice, immunohistochemistry indicated that P. ternata extract effectively suppressed the proliferation of leukemia cells. Therefore, P. ternata extract at 300 mu g/mL and 500 mu g/mL could effectively inhibit myeloid and lymphocytic leukemia cell proliferation and promote leukemia cell apoptosis by regulating Bax/Bcl-2 and caspase-3.