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Evaluating Agents to Manage Low-Risk Myelodysplastic Syndrome

Saeed Sadeghi, MD, clinical professor of medicine at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA in Los Angeles, California, discusses therapeutic options in patients with low-risk myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) at a Case-Based Roundtable event.

At the event, the discussions highlighted impacts on patient quality of life, including fatigue and shortness of breath. There was a concern about the progression to acute myeloid leukemia (AML), although it occurs over a longer period. The event aimed to explore trials of novel agents to improve patient quality of life and reduce transfusion needs.

Sadeghi reviewed agents like luspatercept-aamt (Reblozyl) for its potential to decrease transfusion burdens in both erythropoiesis-stimulating agent (ESA)-naive patients and those resistant to ESAs. Additionally, imetelstat (Rytelo), a telomerase inhibitor, was mentioned as beneficial for patients with high transfusion needs and resistance to ESA.

TRANSCRIPTION:

0:10 | At the event, we discussed low-risk MDS, which definitely is associated with certain morbidity for patients, be it development of fatigue, shortness of breath, and deterioration of quality of life. Of course, there's always a concern, albeit it takes much longer for these patients to progress and develop AML, it's still a concern. So the goal of the program was to look at various trials and the use of novel agents that can potentially impact the patient's quality of life as well as their transfusion needs.

0:56 | Specifically, we talked about luspatercept and the benefit of luspatercept in terms of reducing transfusion burden for these patients, both in the early phase and ESA-naive patient population, as well as also in patients who have progressed on...ESAs or are refractory to them. In addition, we also touched on imetelstat, which is a telomerase inhibitor that has been shown to be beneficial in individuals [whose disease is] failing or resistant to ESAs and have a high transfusion burden of at least 4 units of blood prior to going on trial.