Effect of early relapse on the therapeutic efficacy and survival for patients with multiple myeloma and analysis of risk factors of early relapse / 白血病·淋巴瘤

ABSTRACT

Objective:To investigate the therapeutic efficacy and prognosis of multiple myeloma (MM) patients with early relapse and the influencing factors of early relapse.Methods:The clinical data of 164 patients with newly diagnosed MM admitted to Affiliated Hospital of Hebei University from January 2018 to January 2021 were retrospectively analyzed, and 53 cases (32.3%) relapsed at the end of the follow-up. According to the recurrence within 12 months or not, the patients were divided into early relapse group and advanced relapse group; the clinical characteristics, overall response rate (ORR) and overall survival (OS) of both groups were compared. Logistic regression was used to analyze if the following indexes including age, gender, albumin, lactate dehydrogenase (LDH), β 2-microglobulin (β 2-MG), hemoglobin, creatinine, serum calcium, bone marrow plasma cell ratio, extramedullary disease, high-risk fluorescent in situ hybridization (FISH) were the influencing factors of the early relapse. Based on 7 published clinical trials, simplified early relapse MM (S-ERMM) scoring system was constructed to subgroup all relapsed patients. The difference in risk stratification between early relapsed patients and advanced relapsed patients was compared. Results:The median follow-up time of 164 newly diagnosed MM patients was 26 months (12-48 months). Among 53 relapsed MM patients, 24 cases had early relapse and 29 cases had advanced relapse. The ORR of patients with early relapse was decreased compared with that of those with advanced relapse [70.8% (17/24) vs. 89.7% (26/29), χ2 = 3.04, P = 0.001]. The median OS of the early relapse group was shorter than that of the advanced relapse group (24 months vs. not reached, P < 0.001). The OS of patient in the early relapse group with the best response ≥ complete remission (CR), ≥ very good partial remission (VGPR) and ≥ partial remission (PR) during initial induction therapy was worse than that of those in the advanced relapse group, and the differences were statistically significant ( P values were 0.008, 0.011, 0.012, respectively). Multivariate Logistic regression analysis showed low albumin (<35 g/L vs. ≥35 g/L: OR = 1.644, 95% CI 1.076-2.511, P = 0.022) and high LDH (< the upper limit of normal value vs. ≥ the upper limit of normal value: OR = 0.998, 95% CI 0.985-1.011, P = 0.030) were independent influencing factors of early relapse. Among 24 early relapse patients, there were 5 cases (20.8%), 13 cases (54.2%), 6 cases (25.0%), respectively in the S-ERMM scoring system low-risk, middle-risk, high-risk groups; among 29 advanced relapse patients, there were 18 cases (62.1%),9 cases (31.0%), 2 cases (6.9%), respectively in the S-ERMM scoring system low-risk, middle-risk, high-risk groups; the difference in risk stratification of the S-ERMM scoring system between the early relapse group and the advanced relapse group was statistically significant ( χ2 = 9.09, P = 0.003). Conclusions:MM patients with early relapse have poor therapeutic efficacy and prognosis. The prognosis is not affected by the depth of remission to first-line therapy. Low albumin and high LDH may be independent risk factors of MM patients with early relapse.