For a Jehovah's Witness patient with multiple myeloma, could you safely offer a BCMA-directed bispecific antibody or CAR-T therapy?

Topics: Hematologic Malignancies • Medical Oncology • Myeloma • NCI-CCC Tumor Board Question • University of Washington • NCI-CCC Myeloma Tumor Board Question • Multiple Myeloma

Please assume that IVIG is fine (as it is for many Jehovah's Witness patients, since IgG is often not considered a blood product per se).

Answer from: Medical Oncologist at Academic Institution

Short answer is - yes! Long answer is - it depends. Patients can be optimized leading into CAR T-cell therapy by using ESAs and possible TPO agonists, iron, B12, folate supplementation. The main issue is around propensity for anemia and thrombocytopenia, especially if profound and prolonged. Pa...

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Medical Oncologist at University of Washington, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
Extremely helpful, and I hadn't seen this @Ben&nbs...

Answer from: Medical Oncologist at Community Practice

Jehovah's Witness patients can be under-treated or receive inappropriate care within medical systems because of their views about transfusions. Many of these patients refuse red blood cell or platelet transfusions, but allow for autologous stem cells. From a clinician standpoint, what is...

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Medical Oncologist at University of Washington, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
Completely agree - our center actually did used to...

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