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Primary light-chain (AL) amyloidosis is a rare and fatal plasma cell disease. In recent years, the treatment of AL amyloidosis has changed from the era of bortezomib to the era of daratumumab immunotherapy. However, for the treatment choice of advanced-staged patients, how to achieve organ responses at the early stage and how to monitor the disease are questions that need to be further explored. The 64th American Society of Hematology Annual Meeting in 2022 has reported advances in the diagnosis and treatment of AL amyloidosis, which are briefly reviewed in this article.
ABSTRACT
Systematic light chain (AL) amyloidosis is the most common forms of amyloidosis, which manifests as multiple organ system involvement, rapid progress, dire prognosis, difficult therapy and high mortality. Many patients may miss the optimal treatment as a result of not being diagnosed timely. Therefore, early diagnosis and assessment of involved extent of AL are clinical focuses. Related clinical studies have demonstrated that nuclear medicine imaging can be non-invasive in detecting amyloid deposits. It can not only early assess the extent and distribution of amyloid deposits in systemic AL amyloidosis, but also offer the indications for risk stratification, treatment response monitoring and prognosis assessment of the patients, especially for positron amyloidosis-specific tracers, which may have great prospects in the future. This review summarizes the application of nuclear medicine imaging in the systematic AL amyloidosis.
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Objective@#To improve the understanding of rare anti-myelin-associated glycoprotein (MAG) positive IgM monoclonal gammopathy related peripheral neuropathy (IgM-PN) .@*Methods@#Eleven cases of IgM paraproteinemia and anti-MAG antibody positive neuropathy diagnosed since 2014 in Peking Medical Union College Hospital were summarized. The medical records including clinical manifestation, lab results, treatment and prognosis were analyzed.@*Results@#Among the 11 patients (8 male and 3 female) , the median onset age is 63 years old (range from 52 to 77 years old) . The peripheral neuropathy of 9 patients were characterized by distal onset of numbness, 6 patients suffered from muscle weakness. The nerve conduction velocity study indicated that all 11 patients had demyelinating peripheral nerve damage, which was sensory predominant and more severe in lower limbs, 6 of them had secondary axonal damage. Monoclonal IgM gammopathy was identified in all 11 patients, among which 6 were IgM κ, 2 IgG κ and IgM κ bi-clonal, 3 IgM λ. Three patients were diagnosed with Waldenström’s macroglobulinaemia. The anti-MAG-IgM antibody was positive in all 11 cases. After diagnosis, 9 patients received combination chemotherapy including rituximab or rituximab treatment alone. The monoclonal IgM level declined significantly in 7 patients. The neuropathy was stable or improved.@*Conclusions@#Anti-MAG antibody positive IgM-PN is a rare M protein related disease. In peripheral neuropathy with undetermined etiology, we suggest to screen M protein and anti-MAG antibody. Chemotherapy including rituximab or rituximab alone is recommended as first-line therapy.
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Objective@#To evaluate the response of oral melphalan plus high-dose dexamethasone (MDex) for patients with primary light chain amyloidosis (pAL).@*Methods@#Clinical data, hematological and organ responses, and survival of 76 patients with pAL who had received MDex from January 2009 to July 2017 were retrospectively analyzed.@*Results@#Of 76 patients (47 males and 29 females with the median age of 56 [range, 20-74] years old), 19.70% patients were defined as Mayo 2004 stage 3, involvement of more than or two organs was presented in 65 (85.53%) patients. Among 60 response evaluable patients, overall hematological response was 48.33% with complete response of 20.00% and very good partial response of 20.00%, respectively. The median time to the hematological response was 5 (range, 1-15) months. 36.67% patients achieved organ response. After the median follow up of 23(range, 1-113) months for surviving patients, median progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) were 34 and 43 months, respectively. In a three months landmark analysis, the median rates of PFS and OS were 46 and 65 months, respectively. The median OS rates of patients with Mayo 2004 stage 3 and non Mayo 2004 stage 3 were 5 and 65 months (P=0.001), respectively.@*Conclusions@#MDex was an effective treatment for patients with early stage pAL, but was not suitable for those with severe cardiac involvement.
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Objective@#To evaluate the clinical characteristics and outcomes of very high risk patients with primary immunoglobulin light-chain amyloidosis (pAL) at a single center in China.@*Method@#Clinical data, treatment and outcome of 205 pAL patients in Peking Union Medical College Hospital from January 2009 to February 2016 were retrospectively analyzed. A 'very high risk’ group includes patients with Mayo 2004 stage Ⅲb and Mayo 2012 stage 4.@*Results@#Of 205 patients, 34 (16.6%) were defined as very high risk pAL patients. The median age at diagnosis was 57 (20-84) years, and 22 patients (64.7%) were male. All 34 patients were diagnosed with cardiac involvement, multi-organ involvement was observed in 15 patients (44.1%) , and 27 (81.8%) had New York Heart Association Class Ⅲ or Ⅳ. Median values of serum cTnI, NT-proBNP, and free light chains difference were 0.25 μg/L, 11 733 ng/L, and 403 mg/L, respectively. Eight (24.2%) had more than 10% plasma cell on the bone marrow aspirate. Sixteen (47.1%) patients received bortezomib based chemotherapy and overall hematologic response rate was 58.3%. Median overall survival (OS) was 4 months. The estimated OS at 3, 6, 12, and 24 months was 51.3%, 44.0%, 35.2%, and 29.6%, respectively. Fourteen (41.2%) patients died within 3 months after the diagnosis. The estimated 1-year survival rate for the patients who got hematologic response, without hematologic response, and palliative treatment was 90.9%, 11.1%, and 0, respectively (P<0.001) .@*Conclusion@#Patients with very high risk pAL had very poor prognosis and the early death rate remained high. Those patients who obtained hematologic remission would have significantly better outcomes.
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<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To evaluate the usage of Mayo staging system in Chinese patients with primary light chain (LC) amyloidosis.</p><p><b>METHOD</b>Clinical data, treatment and outcome of 162 primary LC amyloidosis patients with Mayo Clinic staging in Peking Union Medical College Hospital from January 2009 to June 2015 were retrospectively analyzed.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>The median age of 162 patients with Mayo Clinic 2004 stage was 57 (20-81) y, of them 62.3% were male. The number of patients with stage I to III were 44 (27.2%), 69 (42.6%), and 49 (30.2%), respectively. The median overall survival was not reached, 23 months and 12 months in patients with Mayo Clinic 2004 stage I, II, and III, respectively (P<0.001). Among 128 patients with Mayo Clinic 2012 stage, 48 patients (37.5%), 32 patients (25.0%), 32 patients (25.0%) and 16 patients (12.5%) were staged as Mayo Clinic 2012 stage 1 to 4, and the median OS was not reached, not reached, 13 months and 3 months, respectively (P<0.001).</p><p><b>CONCLUSION</b>Mayo Clinic staging systems had important prognostic value in patients with primary LC amyloidosis.</p>
Subject(s)
Adult , Aged , Aged, 80 and over , Female , Humans , Male , Middle Aged , Young Adult , Amyloidosis , Diagnosis , Immunoglobulin Light-chain Amyloidosis , Prognosis , Retrospective StudiesABSTRACT
<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To establish a novel method to determine specific type of amyloidosis through laser microdissection and mass spectrometry (LMD/MS) based proteomic analysis.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>There were 138 formalin-fixed and paraffin-embedded (FFPE) biopsy samples of patients who were diagnosed as systemic amyloidosis used in this study. For each case, a 10 μm section stained with congo-red and positive amyloid deposits were identified under fluorescent light, followed by micro-dissection and mass spectrometry analysis. The amyloidosis subtype was confirmed based on the most abundant amyloid protein.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>The tissue types of 138 specimens were as following: subcutaneous abdominal fat accounted for 26%, tongue for 19%, gingiva for 11%, kidney for 9%, intestine for 9%, heart for 6% and others for 20%. Specific types of amyloid were accurately detected in 121 cases, including 106 (87.6%) amyloid light chain (AL) type, 7 (5.8%) amyloid trans-thy-retin (ATTR), 2 (1.7%) amyloidogenic protein A (AA), 2 (1.7%) amyloid heavy chain (AH)/AL+AH, 2 (1.7%) fibrinogen alpha chain (AFib), 1(0.8%) amyloid apolipoprotein A-type II (AApoA-II) and one (0.8%) amyloid lysozyme (ALys). Diagnosis of amyloidosis was excluded in 5 cases. The types of twelve cases were indeterminate by LMD/MS. On the whole, LMD/MS reached 91.3% accuracy rate in amyloid typing. Commonly involved organs (for example, heart, kidney and liver) turned out to be suitable sources of FFPE samples with typing success rate of almost 100%. In contrast, MS analysis was successful in only 83.3% of subcutaneous abdominal fat samples.</p><p><b>CONCLUSION</b>LMD/MS method provided a more direct technique for accurate typing of amyloidosis in a single procedure.</p>