Bridging the Gaps in Care: Key Posters from the 64th Annual ASH Meeting

The American Society of Hematology’s (ASH) 64th Annual Meeting and Exposition featured ASH Poster Walks, which highlighted key posters on the latest clinical updates and therapeutic advancements in hematology care. Here are some of the latest updates from the ASH Poster Walk on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Hematologic Malignancies and Cellular Therapy.

Investigating the Impact of Hispanic Ethnicity on MM Disease Characteristics

Do the clinical characteristics and outcomes of multiple myeloma (MM) differ between Hispanic and non-Hispanic patients? That’s the question a recent study sought to answer, as presented on a poster featured at the 2022 American Society of Hematology Annual Meeting.

This retrospective cohort study involved 201 patients who were diagnosed with MM at Columbia University Irving Medical Center in New York between January 2018 and December 2021. 76 of those patients were Hispanic while the remaining 125 were either non-Hispanic White, non-Hispanic Black, Asian/Pacific Islander, or another/unknown ethnicity.

To test for differences between categorial values, two-sided Fisher’s exact tests were used, and to compare continuous variables, two-sided Wilcoxon rank sum tests were used. Survival analysis was also completed using the Kaplan-Meier method, and the two-sided log-rank test was used to evaluate the survival curves among the two patient groups.

Through these methods, researchers found no differences in age at diagnosis, ISS or R-ISS stage, clinical presentation, and rates of high-dose melphalan autologous stem cell transplantation based on ethnicity.

However, Hispanics had a 2.5-fold higher incidence of del(1p). They also found that the median progressive-free survival was 30.3 months among Hispanic patients while it was 38.2 months among non-Hispanic patients.

The decrease in del(1p) may be linked to the decreased progressive-free survival, but the researchers noted that longer follow-up is needed to determine whether this cytogenic difference can lead to worse long-term outcomes among patients with MM.

The Effects of Social Vulnerability on the Prognosis & Outcomes of Hodgkin’s Lymphoma

About 10 percent of all cases of lymphoma in the United States are Hodgkin’s lymphoma (HL), or about 8,540 patients. Compared to other hematologic malignancies, HL requires longer follow-up care. But can social determinants of health (SDoH) impact the quality of follow-up care these patients receive?

A recent study explored the multifaceted nature of SDoH, taking into account individual factors of SDoH and race or lower socioeconomic status (SES) to better understand how clinicians can use SDoH to assess HL outcomes. Researchers used a social vulnerability index tool created by the Centers for Disease Control to determine how SDoH impacts prognosis and outcomes in patients with HL.

All adult patients in this study were tracked in the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) program and were geographically matched to determine patients’ social vulnerability using the Social Vulnerability Index (SVI). SVI considers 15 SDoH considerations that fall into four different categories: SES, minority status and language, household composition and disability, and housing type and transportation.

Of the 49,366 patients identified in SEE, 17,597 patients were included in the survey. Of the patients assessed, the study found that the length of survival was directly impacted by the patient’s SVI score or specific social vulnerability. The significant difference between high and low vulnerability groups showed the significant role SDoH has, not only in patient follow-up but also in mortality rates. This study highlights the need to target SDoH in HL to better provide equitable treatment for all patients.