I recently ran into a multiple myeloma friend who was wearing a t-shirt that triggered a memory of an exciting day in my life way back nearly 35 years ago.

It was in the late seventies, and I was a young college student working in the summer as a trumpet player for the (Anheuser) Busch Entertainment Cor­po­ra­tion.

Our music group had been flown to Boston to perform at a series of special events celebrating the introduction of a newly imported …

Panobinostat could be the next potential myeloma therapy approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

Moreover, an approval decision related to the drug's potential marketing in the United States could be made by this fall.

In a surprisingly indirect manner, Novartis, the Swiss pharmaceutical com­pany that is developing pan­o­bino­stat (LBH589), announced this morn­ing that it has filed an application to have pan­o­bino­stat approved as a new drug by the FDA.

The announcement was indirect in the sense …

This year’s American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) annual meeting began yester­day morning in Chicago and will run through Tuesday.

Myeloma-related pre­sen­ta­tions were made during two sessions yes­ter­day.

One session was designed to better educate physicians about per­son­al­ized ther­apy for elderly patients with lymphoid malig­nan­cies. During that session, Dr. Tanya Marya Wildes from the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis talked about how to navigate treat­ment options for older multiple myeloma patients.

The key myeloma-related re­search pre­sented yesterday …

Hello fellow Myeloma Beacon readers. My name is Andrew (Andy works too), and I have been an avid consumer of the many resources offered by The Beacon since my myeloma diagnosis at the end of June 2013.

Throughout my myeloma journey so far – which has included induction treat­ment and a stem cell transplant at the end of January of this year – I have found it particularly helpful to read what others have experienced during their own jour­neys down …

The Myeloma Beacon’s Medical Advisor program is expanding.

The current group of five Beacon Medical Advisors is being joined by five ad­di­tion­al Advisors from leading cancer centers across the United States.

Beacon Medical Advisors are myeloma specialists who assist The Beacon in re­view­ing and re­porting on myeloma-related research.

The most visible role of the Advisors, however, is in helping to answer questions and provide expert perspective in the Beacon’s online discussion forum.

Beacon Medical Advisors regularly …

I just turned 39 last month. Thirty-nine is not a nice, round number. A person’s 39th isn’t traditionally considered a “milestone” birthday. You don’t see Hallmark cards or mylar balloons with a giant “39” on the front.

When you’re 39, nobody puts up funny signs with poems on them like they do when you’re 40. You know: “Lordy, lordy, so-and-so is 40.” What would it be for 39? “It’s fine. It’s fine. Karen is 39.”

See? Nobody wants to see …

After my husband Daniel’s initial diagnosis with monoclonal gam­mop­a­thy of undetermined significance (MGUS) in 2012, I couldn’t shake the feeling that the “treatment” plan of watching and waiting, which had been suggested by a local hematologist/oncologist, was not enough.

The hematologist/oncologist wasn’t a myeloma specialist, and he wasn’t connected to a research hospital. My mother had ovarian center in the 1990s, and I know what an impact it had on her recovery to have had a re­search hospital involved …