Letter to the Editor
Prognostic value of unrelated atypical serum immunofixation patterns during Multiple Myeloma therapy
1 Department of Immunology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Porto, Alameda Professor Hernâni Monteiro, 4200, Porto, Portugal
2 Department of Hematology, Centro Hospitalar São João, Porto, Portugal
3 Department of Medical Oncology, Portuguese Institute of Oncology Francisco Gentil, Porto, Portugal
4 Department of Clinical Pathology, Centro Hospitalar São João, Porto, Portugal, Portugal
Journal of Hematology & Oncology 2012, 5:33 doi:10.1186/1756-8722-5-33
Published: 26 June 2012Abstract
Autologous stem cell transplantation (ASCT) is the gold standard therapy for suitable multiple myeloma (MM) patients after induction with high dose therapy. To date, the evidence of a reliable marker of prognosis in these cases remains scarce. Our aim was to evaluate appearance of unrelated atypical serum immunofixation patterns (ASIPs) as a marker of prognosis in MM patients submitted to ASCT. We retrospectively analysed data from 65 patients. Interestingly, we observed that presence of ASIPs was associated with longer progression-free survival and longer overall survival. Our results suggested that presence of ASIPs could be a novel marker of good prognosis in MM patients submitted to ASCT.
