ASH Clinical News ACN_4.9_Digital_Issue | Page 18

Literature Scan New and noteworthy research from the medical literature landscape NYC Firefighters Exposed to World Trade Center Disaster Have Increased Myeloma Risk New York City firefighters who were exposed to chemicals released into the environment following the World Trade Center (WTC) attacks on September 11, 2001, had an increased risk of both mono- clonal gammopathy of undetermined significance (MGUS) and light-chain MGUS – two myeloma precursor diseases – according to results of a case-series study published in JAMA Oncology. 1 “Based on the [large] number of patients being diagnosed and treated at our myeloma service, we felt there [were] possibly more multiple myeloma (MM) cases among people exposed to the WTC disaster, compared with all other pa- tients we see and treat,” lead investigator Ola Landgren, MD, PhD, professor of medicine and chief attending physician in the myeloma service at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York, told ASH Clinical News. “The prevalence of myeloma precursor disease is twice as high as the general population, and the average age of onset for MM among first responders was 10 to 15 years earlier than the general population.” Researchers worked collaboratively with the NYC fire department to conduct this large study of MM precursor disease among first responders. First, they ob- tained patient data from 12,942 firefight- ers who