Table 2.
Demographic, clinical, and laboratory findings in patients with (n = 95) or without circulating myeloma cells (n = 151)
|
Circulating myeloma cells
|
|||
|---|---|---|---|
| Characteristic | Present | Absent | P |
| Sex, male, % | 65 | 62 | .561 |
| Age, median, y | 58.3 | 56.7 | .306 |
| β2-microglobulin level, median μg/mL | 2.85 | 2.025 | < .001 |
| PCLI, median, % | 0.80 | 0.0 | < .001 |
| BMPC, median, % | 27.0 | 7.0 | < .001 |
| Cytogenetics | < .001 | ||
| Normal | 64 | 83 | — |
| Abnormal | 36 | 17 | — |
| LDH level, median U/L | 180 | 169 | .041 |
| Durie-Salmon stage, % | .634 | ||
| II | 28 | 30 | — |
| III | 72 | 70 | — |
| Disease status at transplantation, % | .001 | ||
| Plateau | 36 | 58 | — |
| Relapse off therapy | 24 | 23 | — |
| Relapse on therapy | 14 | 4 | — |
| Primary refractory | 26 | 15 | |
| Conditioning regimen, % | .237 | ||
| MEL 200 | 84 | 87 | — |
| Other MEL | 7 | 3 | — |
| MEL/TBI | 9 | 10 | — |
| Complete response, % | 33 | 36 | .644 |
| Time to transplantation, months | .334 | ||
| Median | 7.6 | 6.7 | — |
| Range | 3.6-66.0 | 3.8-60.8 | — |
PCLI indicates bone marrow plasma-cell labeling index; BMPC, percentage of bone marrow plasma cells; LDH, lactate dehydrogenase; MEL 200, melphalan at a dose of 200 mg/m2; MEL/TBI refers to melphalan and total body irradiation; and —, not applicable.