The article is called “Analysis of the immune system of multiple myeloma patients achieving long-term disease control by multidimensional flow cytometry.” It makes me think they mean long-term disease control was achieved by flow cytometry. That would be pretty awesome. They really mean that the analysis was done using MFC.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3533663/
Highlights (determined by me)
Multiple myeloma remains largely incurable. However, a few patients experience more than 10 years of relapse-free survival and can be considered as operationally cured. Interestingly, long-term disease control in multiple myeloma is not restricted to patients with a complete response, since some patients revert to having a profile of monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance.
My comments: How can the monoclonal gammopathy be characterized as being of undetermined significance, when the pt has had MM? Obviously, there is a significance. I’m just picking. I know what they mean. It’s good to see that they’re asserting that complete response is not required. I have never had that. I think people put too much emphasis on it.
In summary, our results indicate that multiple myeloma patients with long-term disease control have a constellation of unique immune changes favoring both immune cytotoxicity and recovery of B-cell production and homing, suggesting improved immune surveillance.
My Comments: None, really. I just like the word constellation. :) Dr. Peterson used to use that word a lot.
Despite the fact that until recently MM was considered incurable, the introduction of high dose therapy/autologous stem cell transplantation and novel drugs has made it possible for a small fraction of patients to attain long-term (?5 years) disease control even in the absence of a complete response, after reverting to having an MGUS-like profile. The underlying mechanisms leading to disease suppression in these patients are largely unknown, although immune surveillance has been hypothesized to play a critical role.
My Comments: This is me, in a nutshell. The small fraction.