The main mul­ti­ple myeloma-related poster session at this year's Amer­i­can Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) annual meeting in Chicago took place last Monday. Several of the posters pre­sented during that session focused on poten­tial new mul­ti­ple myeloma ther­a­pies. Those posters were reviewed in the Beacon's previous ASCO mul­ti­ple myeloma up­date.

In this, the Beacon's final ASCO 2016 up­date, the attention shifts to posters from the Monday session that were re­lated to existing myeloma ther­a­pies, as well as a pair of posters re­lated to smol­der­ing mul­ti­ple myeloma.

The posters about existing ther­a­pies …

Die Europäische Arzneimittelkommission hat Empliciti (Elotuzumab) für die Behandlung des multiplen Myeloms zugelassen.

Die Zulassung bedeutet, dass Myelompatienten in Europa mit Empliciti behandelt werden können, ohne sich in eine klinische Studie einschreiben zu müssen.

Die europäische Zulassung von Empliciti folgt der Zulassung in den Vereinigten Staaten im letzten November, dem Markt, auf dem das Medikament seine allererste Zulassung erhalten hat. Wie in den Vereinigten Staaten ist Empliciti in Europa für die Anwendung in Kombination mit Revlimid (Lenalidomid) und Dexamethason zugelassen worden.

Genauer gesagt ist die europäische Zulassung von Empliciti für die Anwendung …

The Euro­pean Com­mis­sion has approved Empliciti (elo­tuzu­mab) for the treat­ment of mul­ti­ple myeloma.

The ap­prov­al means that myeloma patients in Europe will now be able to be treated with Empliciti without having to en­roll in a clin­i­cal trial.

Empliciti's Euro­pean ap­prov­al comes on the heals of its ap­prov­al late last No­vem­ber in the United States, the mar­ket in which the drug re­ceived its first ever regu­la­tory ap­prov­al. As in the United States, Empliciti has been approved in Europe for use in com­bi­na­tion with Revlimid (lena­lido­mide) and dexa­meth­a­sone.

More …

First and only immunostimulatory anti­body approved in the Euro­pean Union for mul­ti­ple myeloma

Accelerated assess­ment and ap­prov­al based on long-term data from ELOQUENT-2, which eval­u­ated Empliciti in com­bi­na­tion with Revlimid® (lena­lido­mide) and dexa­meth­a­sone (Rd)

ELOQUENT-2 dem­onstrated the Empliciti com­bi­na­tion de­liv­ered a 53% rel­a­tive im­prove­ment in pro­gres­sion-free sur­vival vs. Rd alone at three years (23% vs. 15%)

Princeton, NJ (Press Release) – Bristol-Myers Squibb Com­pany (NYSE:BMY) and AbbVie (NYSE:ABBV) an­nounced to­day that the Euro­pean Com­mis­sion has approved Empliciti™ (elo­tuzu­mab) for the treat­ment of mul­ti­ple myeloma as com­bi­na­tion ther­apy with Revlimid® (lena­lido­mide) and dexa­meth­a­sone in patients who have re­ceived at least one prior ther­apy. Empliciti is now the first and only immunostimulatory anti­body approved for mul­ti­ple myeloma in the Euro­pean Union (EU).

The ap­prov­al is based on data from the ran­dom­ized, open-label, Phase 3 ELOQUENT-2 study, which eval­u­ated Empliciti in …

A happy Tuesday to you, myeloma world.

We have some in­ter­est­ing re­search to share with you.

First, we have re­­sults of a Phase 2 study investi­gating Empliciti (elotuzu­mab) in com­bi­na­tion with Velcade (bor­tez­o­mib) and dexa­metha­sone (Decadron) in re­lapsed and re­frac­tory myeloma patients. The re­­sults show that Empliciti plus Velcade and dexa­metha­sone im­proves pro­gres­sion-free sur­vival com­pared to Velcade and dexa­metha­sone alone, without adding any sig­nif­i­cant side effects.

We also report on a study out of Italy that explores using Treanda (benda­mustine) in addi­tion to mel­phalan (Alkeran) as the high-dose chemo­therapy …

As I mentioned in my pre­vi­ous column, I started treat­ment with the newly approved myeloma drug Empliciti (elo­tuzu­mab) in Feb­ru­ary. I thought I would share more details about my ex­peri­ences with the drug so far.

Before I started treat­ment with Empliciti, I had enjoyed a drug holiday for the pre­vi­ous three months. I ap­pre­ci­ated the break from the side effects of drugs and nu­mer­ous trips to the cancer center.

Before the drug holiday, I was on Kyprolis (car­filz­o­mib), Revlimid (lena­lido­mide) and dexamethasone (Decadron) for …

What a year 2015 was for the myelomatologist!

The U.S. Food and Drug Admin­istra­tion (FDA) ap­prov­al of three new myeloma drugs, all within the span of a few weeks to­wards the end of the year, had already gen­er­ated great ex­cite­ment in the com­munity.

Then, sev­er­al poten­tial prac­tice-changing pre­sen­ta­tions at the 2015 American Society of He­ma­tol­ogy (ASH) annual meeting put the proverbial icing on the cake to round out a landmark year for myeloma thera­peutics.

This edition of the myeloma quiz highlights some of the key takeaways from the ASH 2015 meeting.