Results of a recent British study in­di­cate that the rel­a­tive­ importance of factors affecting sur­vival in multiple myeloma patients changes with patient age.

In particular, the re­searchers found that the older a patient is at diag­nosis, the more their sur­vival is affected by their general health and by how ad­vanced their multiple myeloma is at diag­nosis.

In contrast, the impact of high-risk chromosomal ab­nor­mal­i­ties on sur­vival de­creases with patient age.

The study findings are based on an analysis of data for almost 4,000 newly diag­nosed multiple myeloma patients who par­tic­i­pated in the …

A team of Dutch researchers has published results of a small study in­ves­ti­gat­ing the impact of Darzalex treat­ment on immuno­glob­u­lin levels in multiple myeloma patients.

In their study, the researchers focus in particular on how the levels of a patient’s un­in­volve­d immuno­glob­u­lins are affected by treat­ment with Darzalex.

Uninvolved immuno­glob­u­lins in myeloma patients are immuno­glob­u­lins that have a type dif­fer­en­t from any mono­clonal immuno­glob­u­lin made by a patient’s myeloma cells.

Someone with IgG multiple myeloma, for example, has myeloma plasma cells that produce mono­clonal immuno­glob­u­lin G (IgG). For this myeloma patient, the …

Swiss researchers have published results of a small clin­i­cal trial testing whether nelfinavir, a drug originally used to treat AIDS, can overcome resistance to Revlimid in re­lapsed multiple myeloma patients.

The trial was motivated by pre­vi­ous research showing that nelfinavir can overcome resistance to Velcade, for a period of time, in many re­lapsed myeloma patients.

Unfortunately, the results of the more recent nelfinavir trial are not as en­cour­ag­ing as the pre­vi­ous research involving nelfinavir and Velcade. Less than a third of the patients in the more recent trial responded to the three-drug …

A major source of op­ti­mism in the myeloma com­munity these days is the large num­ber of poten­tially very ef­fec­tive treat­ments under devel­op­ment for the dis­ease.

Increasing the num­ber of ef­fec­tive treat­ment op­tions for the dis­ease could lead to a sizable jump in sur­vival for both newly diag­nosed and re­lapsed mul­ti­ple myeloma patients.

There is, how­ever, a common theme among many of the promising inves­ti­ga­tional ther­a­pies for mul­ti­ple myeloma that could limit their ability to make as large an im­pact on myeloma sur­vival as many hope. The common theme can be summarized in …

A team of U.S. researchers has published the results of an in­ves­ti­ga­tion into eyelid-related com­pli­ca­tions in multiple myeloma patients receiving treat­ment with Velcade or Kyprolis. Drawing on the results of their in­ves­ti­ga­tion, the authors of the new study also propose guidelines for the prevention and man­agement of such com­pli­ca­tions.

The authors report on a case series of 16 patients who devel­oped either blepharitis or chalazia after starting treat­ment with Velcade (bor­tez­o­mib) or Kyprolis (car­filz­o­mib).

Blepharitis is the medical term for chronic inflammation of the eyelid, and a chalazion is a cyst in …

Results of a recent retro­spec­tive­ study show that radiation ther­apy shortly before, or shortly after, the start of drug-based treat­ment in newly diag­nosed multiple myeloma patients is asso­ci­ated with lower over­all survival.

The results are based on in­for­ma­tion for 78,095 multiple myeloma patients from the United States whose data were reported to the National Cancer Data Base be­tween 2004 and 2015.

For their retro­spec­tive­ analysis, the authors of the new study divided the 78,095 patients in their sample into two groups.

One group in­cluded the patients who were found to have undergone …

An inter­na­tional team of researchers recently found that people with MGUS who consumed fruit at least three times a week had a lower risk of pro­gress­ing to multiple myeloma than people with MGUS who consumed fruit less frequently.

The impact of higher fruit consumption on risk of pro­gres­sion was sizable. The statistical models developed by the researchers indicate that eating fruit three times or more each week cut the risk of pro­gres­sion by at least a half.

The researchers also found that the risk of devel­op­ing MGUS was about 35 per­cent lower …