Professor Jesus San Miguel from University Hospital of Salamanca, Spain, talks to Professor Faith Davies, Royal Marsden Hospital (London, UK) and Professor Antonio Palumbo from University of Torino (Turin, Italy) about hot news from ASH 2012 in multiple myeloma (MM).

Professor Davies comments on the change in the MM environment with the introduction of the newer agents, such as immunomodulatory drugs and proteasome inhibitors, and the benefits to quality of life for older and younger patients.  She talks about the latest data with pomalidomide (a third generation immunomodulatory drug) in double-relapse and refractory patients, which shows an increase in PFS and OS, with minimal adverse effects.

Professor Palumbo comments on the ASH 2012 session on doublets, triplets and quadruplets, and the impact of these various regimens on OS and PFS.  Professor Palumbo also comments on the latest data from the MPR trial and on the latest data with carfilzomib (a second generation proteasome inhibitor), which shows promising data for safety efficacy and speed of response.

The experts share their views on the hot topic of consolidation and maintenance, comment on progress in balancing efficacy versus toxicity, and on the issue of secondary malignancies.

Professor San Miguel concludes that the outlook for patients looks bright, with several novel drugs looking promising for patients, including oral proteasome inhibitors, monoclonal antibodies and anti-CD38 agents. 

This programme has been supported by an unrestricted educational grant from Janssen Pharmaceutica (A Johnson & Johnson Company).