Lenalidomide reduces need for transfusions in some MDS patients

There are several subtypes of myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS), but they are all disorders in which the cells in the bone marrow don't function normally and not enough normal blood cells are produced. Revlimid (lenalidomide) treats a specific type of MDS that is associated with a genetic mutation on chromosome 5. Many individuals with MDS also need regular blood transfusions to treat anemia.

Researchers at the H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute in Tampa, Florida, conducted a multicenter clinical trial evaluating lenalidomide therapy for transfusion-dependent individuals who had low- or intermediate-1-risk MDS but did not have the chromosome 5 abnormality. In the study, 214 individuals received 10 mg of oral lenalidomide daily or 10 mg on days 1 to 21 of a 28-day cycle. Of these people, 56 (26%) patients no longer needed blood transfusions after a median of 4.8 weeks of treatment. A 50% or greater reduction in transfusion requirement occurred in 37 additional patients, yielding a 43% overall rate of improvement with the lenalidomide treatment. These results show that lenalidomide could be used as treatment for people with MDS who don't have the chromosome 5 abnormality.

Raza, Azra, James A. Reeves, Eric J. Feldman, Gordon W. Dewald, John M. Bennett, H. Joachim Deeg, Luke Dreisbach, Charles A. Schiffer, Richard M. Stone, Peter L. Greenberg, Peter T. Curtin, Virginia M. Klimek, Jamile M. Shammo, Deborah Thomas, Robert D. Knight, Michele Schmidt, Kenton Wride, Jerome B. Zeldis, & Alan F. List. "Phase 2 study of lenalidomide in transfusion-dependent, low-risk, and intermediate-1-risk myelodysplastic syndromes with karyotypes other than deletion 5q." Blood 111(2008): 86-93.