Prevalence of Thrombotic Events, Links to Age in Patients With Newly Diagnosed MM Examined

A study of patients with newly diagnosed multiple myeloma (MM) provides insight into the prevalence of, and risk for, thrombotic events in this population and gauges effects of these events on overall survival (OS). Patient age was found to be independently associated with high risk for these events in the study population, and thrombotic events shortened patient OS. These findings were presented in a research article published in Hematology.

“In our study, about 10% of patients with primary multiple myeloma experienced a thrombotic event during the course of their disease. Therefore, we need to emphasize thromboprophylaxis in myeloma patients, especially in elderly patients,” wrote the team of investigators from Zhabei Central Hospital, Shanghai, China, who conducted the study.

The study retrospectively analyzed clinical data compiled from a cohort of 181 patients with newly diagnosed MM who were treated at a single hospital center. This cohort had a median follow-up of 37 months. The median OS was not reached, and the median progression-free survival (PFS) was 36 months.

Thrombotic events affected 11.0% of the study cohort. Specifically, venous thrombosis occurred in 8.28% of the cohort and arterial thrombosis in 2.76%. Among the patients who had thrombotic events, 55% were men, and the median time to a thrombotic event was 4.5 months.

“Even with prophylactic antithrombotic therapy with aspirin in NDMM [newly diagnosed MM] patients using IMiDs [immunomodulatory drugs], 14.4% of patients experienced a TE [thrombotic event],” the investigators noted.

The investigators found patients affected by thrombotic events were older than unaffected patients, with a median age of 70 versus 64, respectively (P=0.018). Univariate analysis revealed a link of such events to age with a hazard ratio (HR) of 1.061 (P=0.019). This association was likewise found in the multivariable analysis, which adjusted for interphase fluorescence in situ hybridization, International Staging System for disease, patients’ induction regimens, lactate dehydrogenase levels, M protein types, and sex, with an HR of 1.103 (P=0.016).

Thrombotic events negatively affected patients’ median OS; median OS was 27 months in patients with thrombotic events and not reached in those without (P=0.016). The median PFS times for patients with and without thrombotic events were 26 and 36 months, respectively (P=0.807), but the investigators did not consider this difference statistically significant.

The investigators found that patients with arterial thrombosis had a median OS of 16 months, which was shorter than the OS for those with venous thrombosis (P=0.049) and those with no thrombotic events (P=0.006). From this result they determined that arterial thrombosis affects OS more severely than venous thrombosis.

Reference

Chen H, Zhang Y, Wang Z, et al. Thrombotic events in patients with multiple myeloma and their impact on overall survival. Hematology. 2025;30(1):2464316. doi:10.1080/16078454.2025.2464316