Patient Perspectives: Initial Diagnosis of Multiple Myeloma
July 30th 2025Panelists discuss how a patient with multiple myeloma initially experienced severe fatigue, hair loss, swelling from kidney dysfunction, and overwhelming pain before being misdiagnosed with lupus, ultimately requiring emergency care where blood work and bone marrow biopsy confirmed both multiple myeloma and amyloidosis, leading to successful treatment with chemotherapy followed by stem cell transplant that achieved 5.5 years of remission monitored through regular blood draws tracking light chain levels.
Karen's Story: Navigating Multiple Myeloma Treatment Lines
July 30th 2025Panelists discuss how multiple myeloma patients navigate complex treatment journeys through multiple relapses, clinical trials, and the transformative potential of bispecific antibody therapies like talquetamab, with patient Karen Kehl sharing her 15-year experience from initial diagnosis through 19 treatment cycles including three transplants and various clinical trials.
Best Practices for Referring Patients for CAR T Therapy
July 28th 2025Panelists discuss the growing importance of early integration and collaboration between community oncologists and specialized centers in the evolving chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy landscape for multiple myeloma, emphasizing timely referrals, coordinated care, and strategic sequencing with other immunotherapies to optimize patient outcomes.
Supportive Care: Infection Disease Prophylaxis and Advice for Community Doctors
July 28th 2025Panelists discuss the essential role of supportive care following chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy in multiple myeloma, emphasizing infection prevention through prophylaxis, immunoglobulin replacement, and vaccination strategies, along with the importance of coordinated long-term management between CAR T centers and community oncologists to ensure sustained survivorship care.
Panelists discuss how the extended follow-up data from MonumenTAL-1 show consistent safety outcomes for talquetamab with manageable discontinuation rates due to skin changes and weight loss, while acknowledging that GPRC5D targeting creates unique toxicities including nail and skin changes that require proactive management strategies, particularly as treatment transitions from academic centers to community practice where quality-of-life considerations become increasingly important.
Frontline Treatment Decisions in ALK+ NSCLC
July 25th 2025Panelists discuss how treatment selection between lorlatinib and alectinib for ALK-positive non–small cell lung cancer should consider both efficacy data favoring lorlatinib and patient-specific factors like neuropsychiatric history or cardiovascular comorbidities that might favor alectinib.
Nivo-Rela vs Nivo-Ipi: What 4-Year ITC and Real-World Data Tell Us About Treatment Selection
Panelists discuss real-world evidence comparing immunotherapy combinations for metastatic melanoma, highlighting retrospective analyses showing similar efficacy between nivolumab plus relatlimab and nivolumab plus ipilimumab, while emphasizing the relatlimab-based regimen’s lower toxicity and the need for individualized treatment decisions in patients who fall outside typical clinical trial populations.
Treatment Workflow for IDH-Mutant Gliomas
July 25th 2025Panelists discuss how they approach the treatment journey by prioritizing early IDH mutation detection, coordinating multidisciplinary teams for maximal safe resection, and utilizing advanced surgical techniques to optimize outcomes while preserving neurologic function.
Clinical Case: ALK-Positive Advanced NSCLC
July 25th 2025Panelists discuss how a 48-year-old fitness instructor with ALK-rearranged stage IV lung cancer and bone metastases was successfully treated with alectinib, experiencing manageable adverse effects while returning to modified teaching activities.
RELATIVITY-047 at 4 Years: What Long-Term Data Mean for Sarah’s Treatment Options
Panelists discuss the prioritization of immunotherapy over targeted therapy for BRAF-mutant metastatic melanoma, highlighting updated RELATIVITY-047 data supporting nivolumab plus relatlimab for its durable efficacy and favorable toxicity profile, and emphasizing the importance of individualized treatment selection based on evolving evidence, patient goals, and comparative analyses of combination regimens.
Teclistamab: OPTEC Trial Overview
Panelists discuss how the OPTEC trial and other studies demonstrate that outpatient teclistamab administration with prophylactic tocilizumab is feasible and safe, with no cytokine release syndrome (CRS) events reported in community settings, while acknowledging that Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategies (REMS) requirements remain a significant barrier to broader community adoption despite the reality that most CRS is now grade 1-2 and manageable with supportive care, suggesting the field needs to follow lymphoma’s example of bispecifics without REMS restrictions.