Irene Ghobrial, MD

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spoke with Irene Ghobrial, MD, director, Clinical Investigator Research Program, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Lavine Family Chair for Preventative Cancer Therapies, and professor of medicine, Harvard Medical School, to learn more about future efforts to prevent the development of multiple myeloma.

Initiating immunotherapy earlier in the treatment journey may be a focus of future research efforts in this disease. Immunotherapy may even be introduced as early as smoldering myeloma, when the immune system is stronger and tumor burden is lower. Ghobrial explained that the goal is to harness the immune system to eliminate myeloma without the need for conventional therapy.

Other efforts are being focused on precision interception in smoldering myeloma, such as giving patients venetoclax (Venclexta) if they have a t(11;14) translocation, Ghobrial explains. Certain biomarkers can indicate which form of immunotherapy is optimal for each patient; these approaches can include bispecific antibodies, CAR T-cell therapy, or natural killer cell therapies, Ghobrial says.

Those who have high-risk smoldering myeloma should not just be treated with 1 approach, Ghobrial adds. The future should consist of stronger risk stratification, a better understanding of who will progress to multiple myeloma, and more insight on how to effectively leverage immune or genomic biomarkers to inform the appropriate therapeutic intervention for these patients, Ghobrial concludes.

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The director at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute discussed future efforts to prevent the development of multiple myeloma. 

Irene Ghobrial, MD

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Future Research With NK and CAR T Therapy in Multiple Myeloma: Irene Ghobrial, MD