MPN Workshop of the Carolinas 2024 | Deciding which patients with MPNs are suitable candidates for interferon-based therapy

What patients would be suitable candidates? So that is a loaded question.

And so, you know, when I think about interferon in my own clinical practice, I tend to think about what patients are not suitable candidates. And so, I think that interferon should at least be considered for a large number of patients.

So when we think about younger patients, that tends to be my go to. So there’s the potential there for disease modification, and so in a patient who’s younger who will live with these diseases for a longer period of time, I think about that in many situations. We use it especially in younger women, because interferon is the only agent that is safe in the context of pregnancy, as we saw discussed in some of the other talks. So for the younger patient population and especially younger females, this is a really important consideration.

That being said, I do tend to use interferon in older patients as well. There are some side effects of the drug that I think need to be considered and that’s very patient specific. So there’s some autoimmune effects of these drugs and so in patients who have underlying history of autoimmune disorders, we obviously think very carefully before utilizing this type of agent. There’s also some side effects when it comes to mental health and perhaps some worsening of some anxiety and depression, and so those, considerations come into play.

But really, I do think that that we should at least consider interferon use for all patients, as we’re thinking about the patient individually and then within the context of all the novel studies and therapies that we have within the field.