OUH consultant to study earlier detection of relapse in people with multiple myeloma

Dr Karthik Ramasamy

A consultant haematologist at Oxford University Hospitals (OUH) has received funding from Cancer Research UK to assess a new mass spectrometry-based monitoring technique for its ability to predict and identify early relapse in patients with myeloma, a cancer of the bone marrow.

The disease is currently incurable, but many people can survive for more than 10 years after diagnosis. However, around one in five people with myeloma have a high-risk form of the disease, which is characterised by earlier relapse after successful initial treatment, leading to a shorter survival of only two to three years.

The challenge for clinicians is predicting when relapse will occur so that these people can be targeted with effective alternative therapies before advanced disease happens. Current methods of disease monitoring are not sufficiently sensitive to pick up these early warning signs.

In this CRUK award, OUH haematology consultant Dr Karthik Ramasamy, who is also Clinical Director of the Oxford Translational Myeloma Centre, together with Dr Ceri Bygrave of University Hospital of Wales, in Cardiff, will lead research into a new monitoring technique called quantitative immunoprecipitation-mass spectrometry (QIP-MS).

The researchers will test the ability of QIP-MS to predict and detect relapse earlier compared to currently used techniques in people with high-risk myeloma taking part in the Myeloma XV RADAR trial.

QIP-MS uses blood samples, rather than bone marrow, meaning that, if it proves to be more sensitive, patients undergoing regular monitoring would be subjected to fewer painful procedures.