Uwe Platzbecker, MD, on Key Research, Updates in Low-Risk MDS

Uwe Platzbecker, MD, of the University Hospital Leipzig, joins Chadi Nabhan, MD, MBA, FACP, host of The HemOnc Pulse, at the Eleventh Annual Meeting of the Society of Hematologic Oncology to discuss key questions and research surrounding low-risk and high-risk myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS).

Dr. Platzbecker discussed the system that is commonly used to distinguish low-risk MDS from high-risk MDS.

“It’s a moving target, how we define low-risk and high-risk MDS, but I think for the sake of the current time, the majority of us prognosticate patients based on the IPSS-R—the Revised International Prognostic Scoring System—which takes into account the number of blast cells, cytogenetics, and also the extent of cytopenia,” Dr. Platzbecker said.

He explained that the “current definition of low-risk MDS is the subgroup of patients with a very low and low risk IPSS-R, plus the intermediate risk, if the blast count in the bone marrow does not exceed 5%.”

Dr. Nabhan and Dr. Platzbecker also discussed how the definition of low-risk MDS can impact inclusion and exclusion criteria for clinical trials.

“An example of this is the COMMANDS trial which looked at low-risk MDS,” Dr. Nabhan said.

Dr. Platzbecker explained how low-risk MDS was defined in the phase III COMMANDS trial of luspatercept, as well as in the phase III MEDALIST trial of luspatercept. He also discussed the key safety data surrounding luspatercept that he and his colleagues have gathered in clinical trials.