Remember Love Canal?

If you came of age in the 1970s or earlier in the United States, you surely re­mem­ber Love Canal.

Love Canal was a neighborhood in Niagara Falls, New York, built atop a chem­i­cal waste dump that had been closed and covered with dirt in the early 1950s. An elementary school was built first, followed soon by the houses.

Even though residents soon started noticing odd smells and oily sub­stances leaching up into the play­ground, it wasn’t until 1976 that the dump, after unusually heavy rains and winter weather, …

Findings from a prospective Phase 2 clinical trial indicate that the com­bi­na­tion of Revlimid, Velcade, and dexamethasone is effective in relapsed and refractory multiple myeloma patients.

The trial enrolled 64 patients, who had been treated with a median of two prior therapies, at six different U.S. cancer centers from 2006 to 2008.

Nearly two-thirds of the patients in the trial achieved at least a partial re­sponse, despite the fact that more than half of the patients had previous­ly been treated with Velcade (bortezomib), and nearly three quarters had previously been …

The findings of a recent retrospective study may alleviate some of the concerns patients and physicians have had about Revlimid and the risk of secondary cancers.

The study found that the risk of developing a secondary cancer as a result of treatment with Revlimid occurred mainly when a patient had been treated with oral melphalan at the same time as Revlimid.

Revlimid (lenalidomide) did not appear to be associated with an in­creased risk of secondary cancers when administered together with dexamethasone or cyclophosphamide.

In addition, although treatment with Revlimid before …

One of the issues that a physician may consider when deciding how to treat a myeloma patient is the impact different treatment options may have on the pa­tient’s bones.

If a patient already has extensive bone damage resulting from multiple myelo­ma, a physician may lean more toward treatments that are believed to halt, or even counteract, the bone destruction the patient has been experiencing.

Previous research has shown that Velcade (bortezomib) may be able to help rebuild the bones of myeloma patients (see related Beacon news).

However, there is currently …

The year 2013 is likely to be remembered as a very good year when it comes to re­search related to multiple myeloma.

Previous years have witnessed re­search shedding new light on existing my­e­lo­ma ther­a­pies, as well as addi­tional re­search about poten­tial new ther­a­pies.

But, in the past, most of the im­por­tant new ther­a­pies that were being re­searched were from existing classes of ther­apy, making them less likely to offer dramatic im­prove­ments in the treat­ment of the dis­ease.

In 2013, not only was there more re­search about existing ther­a­pies, and more re­search about …

One of the key presentations during the recent American Society of Hematology (ASH) annual meeting in New Orleans was one that summarized initial results of a large international Phase 3 clinical trial known as the "FIRST", or MM-020, trial.

The trial results show that continuous administration of Revlimid and dex­a­meth­a­sone improves response rates as well as progression-free and overall survival in newly diagnosed multiple myeloma patients who are older or not eligible for stem cell transplantation.

Specifically, the researchers found that the overall response rate was highest (75 percent) among patients who received …

Findings from a recent retrospective study conducted at the Mayo Clinic show that certain newly diagnosed myeloma patients can achieve deep responses and long-term disease control through extended treatment with Revlimid and dex­a­meth­a­sone.

Among a large sample of patients who were initially treated with Revlimid and dex­a­meth­a­sone after diagnosis – and who did not undergo an early stem cell transplant – one fifth received the two-drug therapy for more than three years.

Almost two thirds of these patients who were treated for more than three years achieved at least a very good partial response …