Elevated inflammatory markers are associated with poor outcomes in various types of cancers; however, their clinical significance in multiple myeloma (MM) have seldom been explored. This study investigated the prognostic relevance of neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR), platelet-to-lymphocyte ratio (PLR), and monocyte-to-lymphocyte ratio (MLR) in MM. Totally 559 MM patients were included in this study. NLR, PLR and MLR were calculated from whole blood counts prior to therapy. Kaplan-Meier curves and multivariate Cox proportional models were used for the evaluation of the survival. It has shown that newly diagnosed MM patients were characterized by high NLR and MLR. Elevated NLR and MLR and decreased PLR were associated with unfavorable clinicobiological features. Applying cut-offs of 4 (NLR), 100 (PLR) and 0.3 (MLR), elevated NLR, MLR and decreased PLR showed a negative impact on outcome. Importantly, elevated NLR and decreased PLR were independent prognostic factors for progression-free survival. Thus, elevated NLR and MLR, and decreased PLR predict poor clinical outcome in MM patients and may serve as the cost-effective and readily available prognostic biomarkers.

Purpose: Accumulating evidence indicates that intratumor heterogeneity is prevalent in multiple myeloma and that a collection of multiple, genetically distinct subclones are present within the myeloma cell population. It is not clear whether the size of clonal myeloma populations harboring unique cytogenetic abnormalities carry any additional prognostic value.Experimental Design: We analyzed the prognostic impact of cytogenetic aberrations by fluorescence in situ hybridization at different cutoff values in a cohort of 333 patients with newly diagnosed myeloma and 92 patients with relapsed myeloma.Results: We found that nearly all IgH-related arrangements were observed in a large majority of the purified plasma cells; however, 13q deletion, 17p deletion, and 1q21 amplification appeared in different percentages within the malignant plasma cell population. Based on the size of subclones carrying these cytogenetic aberrations, the patients were divided into four groups: 0%-10%, 10.5%-20%, 20.5%-50%, and >50%. Receiver-operating characteristics analysis was applied to determine the optimal cutoff value with the greatest differential survival and showed that the most powerful clone sizes were 10% for 13q deletion, 50% for 17p deletion, and 20% for 1q21 gains, which provided the best possible cutoffs for predicting poor outcomes.Conclusions: Our study indicated that the impact of clone size on prognostic value varies between specific genetic abnormalities. Prognostic value was observed for even a subgroup of plasma cells harboring the cytogenetic aberration of 13q deletion and 1q21 gains; however, 17p deletion displayed the most powerful cutoff for predicting survival only if the predominant clones harbored the abnormality.

U2AF1 mutations (U2AF1MT) occur commonly in myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) without ring sideroblasts. The aim of this study was to investigate the clinical and biological implications of different U2AF1 mutation types in MDS. We performed targeted gene sequencing in a cohort of 511 MDS patients. Eighty-six patients (17%) were found to have U2AF1MT, which occurred more common in younger patients (P = .001) and represented ancestral lesions in a substantial proportion (71%) of cases. ASXL1MT and isolated +8 were significantly enriched in U2AF1MT-positive cases, whereas TP53MT, SF3B1MT, and complex karyotypes were inversely associated with U2AF1MT. U2AF subjects were enriched for isolated +8 and were inversely associated with complex karyotypes. U2AF1MT was significantly associated with anemia, thrombocytopenia, and poor survival in both lower-risk and higher-risk MDS. U2AF1 subjects had more frequently platelet levels of <50 × 10 /L (P = .043) and U2AF1 /U2AF1 subjects had more frequently hemoglobin concentrations at <80 g/L (P = .008) and more often overt fibrosis (P = .049). In conclusion, our study indicates that U2AF1MT is one of the earliest genetic events in MDS patients and that different types of U2AF1MT have distinct clinical and biological characteristics.

Extensive studies of the genetic aberrations related to human diseases conducted over the last two decades have identified recurrent genomic abnormalities as potential driving factors underlying a variety of cancers. Over the time, a series of cutting-edge high-throughput genetic tests, such as microarrays and next-generation sequencing, have been developed and incorporated into routine clinical practice. Although it is a classical low-throughput cytogenetic test, fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) does not show signs of fading; on the contrary, it plays an increasingly important role in detecting specific biomarkers in solid and hematologic neoplasms and has therefore become an indispensable part of the rapidly developing field of personalized medicine. In this article, we have summarized the recent advances in FISH application for both de novo discovery and routine detection of chromosomal rearrangements, amplifications, and deletions that are associated with the pathogenesis of various hematopoietic and non-hematopoietic malignancies. In addition, we have reviewed the recent developments in FISH methodology as well.