Key clinical point: Higher doses of hypomethylating agents, azacytidine (AZA) and decitabine (DAC), can help achieve higher rates of transfusion independence (TI) in patients with low-risk myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS). However, benefits should be weighed against the risk for adverse events.
Major finding: TI rate was higher with AZA (75 mg/m 2/day for 7 days) than other regimens ( P less than .025). The rate of grade 3/4 anemia was higher (15.8% vs. 0.0%; P less than .0001) and that of diarrhea/constipation (6.9% vs. 25.0%; P = .002) was lower with DAC (20 mg/m 2/day for 3 days) vs. AZA (75 mg/m 2/day for 5 days).
Study details : Findings are from a meta-analysis of 19 prospective studies including 1,076 patients with low-risk MDS.
Disclosures: The study was funded by Beijing Natural Science Foundation, the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences (CAMS) Innovation Fund for Medical Sciences, and the Non-profit Central Research Institute Fund of CAMS. The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest.
Source: Wan Z et al. Aging (Albany NY). 2021 Mar 26. doi: 10.18632/aging.202767 .