Based on comments on my first article about nutritional supplements that I wrote a couple of weeks ago, I was able to identify four important questions anyone should consider before deciding to take a nutritional supplement:

What benefits do you hope to achieve? Are the contents in the bottle what the label says they are? How much do they cost? Are there any risks to taking them?

All good questions. But I would like to stay focused on the first and last question: “What benefits do you hope to …

Strings of colored lights brighten the darkness of the season. Last week, a winter solstice full moon ornamented the sky with a radiant glow. I hoped to catch a glimpse of the rare lunar eclipse, but all I could see from my location was a veil of snowy clouds behind tall treetops—no moon glow in sight. And so it is living with multiple myeloma—much is hidden from view, such as abnormal cells and holes in bones.

Soon we mark the start of a new calendar year, the second decade of …

As the 2010 holiday season reaches it peak, all of us here at The Myeloma Beacon would like to thank you, our readers, for giving us the greatest gift possible: your time.  We appreciate your coming to The Beacon and reading our articles, sharing your thoughts about them with us, and discussing them – and many other topics! – in our forums.

The holiday season is a time of many different traditions.  It also is a busy time, when it is easy to lose track of the special meaning this …

Last week I wrote about how taking nutritional supplements is like walking through a mine field for multiple myeloma patients.  So this week, I’ll describe my nutritional supplement plan.

First, let me describe the prescription medications that I take:

Revlimid (lenalidomide) is my monthly chemotherapy drug.

Warfarin (Coumadin) is a generic blood thinner. I use it to prevent blood clots that may be caused by Revlimid.

Oxycodone and Tylenol help my bone pain.

Gabapentin (Neurontin) helps my peripheral neuropathy symptoms.

My peripheral neuropathy (pain and tingling in the …

A recent study showed that Velcade maintenance therapy modestly increased and deepened responses in elderly, newly diagnosed multiple myeloma patients after Velcade-based induction therapy. Maintenance therapy also caused small increases in the frequency of side effects.

Dr. Ruben Niesvizky of Weill Cornell Medical College in New York presented the study results at the American Society of Hematology (ASH) annual meeting in Orlando at the beginning of the month.

Prior to the recent development of novel therapeutic agents, the treatment for multiple myeloma was limited primarily to conventional chemotherapy and stem …

One of the things I think I know is that multiple myeloma is often harder on caregivers than it is on the person with the disease.

To some, that may seem counter-intuitive. You’d probably consider that the person with the disease is the one confronting the harder road to travel on, but I believe such a perspective ignores the turmoil, the emotional roller-coaster. and the uncertainty that caregivers face.

I don’t mean to diminish the impact of what becomes an endless life-and-death battle with disease for those with myeloma. I …

Carfilzomib is well tolerated and highly active in both newly diagnosed multiple myeloma patients as well as re­lapsed and treat­ment-resistant patients, according to the results of two recent clinical trials that were presented at the American Society of Hematology 2010 annual meeting in Orlando earlier this month.

These results further underscore car­filz­o­mib’s activity in multiple myeloma.  Several studies with promising results were also reported in poster sessions during the annual meeting (see related Beacon news).

Like Velcade (bor­tez­o­mib), carfilzomib (Kyprolis), which is being developed by Onyx Pharmaceuticals, …