SOHO 2023 | Addressing unmet needs in myelofibrosis: alleviating anemia
John Mascarenhas, MD, Mount Sinai Medical Center, New York, NY, discusses unmet needs in the field of myeloproliferative neoplasms (MPNs), particularly patients with myelofibrosis (MF) and anemia, which often worsens with disease course. Dr Mascarenhas highlights momelotinib and pacritinib as therapeutics which can address unmet needs for patients with MF and anemia and/or thrombocytopenia. This interview took place at the Eleventh Annual Meeting of the Society of Hematologic Oncology (SOHO 2023) held in Houston, TX.
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Transcript (edited for clarity)
There still remain a lot of unmet needs in myeloproliferative neoplasms, specifically in myelofibrosis. There’s a lot of focus on alleviating anemia, which is a very prevalent sign and symptom of myelofibrosis, and worsens with disease course and is an adverse prognostic marker. So, there are a lot of drugs in development to try to address both disease-related anemia and therapy-related anemia, which many of the therapies we use exacerbate anemia...
There still remain a lot of unmet needs in myeloproliferative neoplasms, specifically in myelofibrosis. There’s a lot of focus on alleviating anemia, which is a very prevalent sign and symptom of myelofibrosis, and worsens with disease course and is an adverse prognostic marker. So, there are a lot of drugs in development to try to address both disease-related anemia and therapy-related anemia, which many of the therapies we use exacerbate anemia. Momelotinib is a JAK1/2/ACVR1 inhibitor that’s hopefully going to get approved at the end of this month, September of 2023, for patients with myelofibrosis and symptom and spleen burden, with the advantage over ruxolitinib and fedratinib of anemia benefit. That would be a welcome addition to the armamentarium of myelofibrosis treatment. Then, we already have pacritinib that’s been commercially available since last year. This is a JAK2/IRAK1/ACVR1 inhibitor, in fact more potent of an ACVR1 inhibitor than momelotinib, which can be delivered in patients with thrombocytopenia. This really has been an unmet need, which I think is being addressed now with pacritinib, because ruxolitinib and fedratinib really were not effective agents to use in patients with platelets less than 50,000, and the label wasn’t for that. So, with pacritinib, you can treat patients with low platelets and also enjoy an anemia response, which is about 25%.
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