The Cancer Center was selected as one of the few nationwide to provide this kind of treatment to patients with multiple myeloma because of the center’s existing expertise and success in treating lymphoma with CAR T-cell therapy. The Cancer Center participated in the original clinical trials that led to CAR T-cell therapy receiving Food and Drug Administration approval in 2017 for large B-cell lymphoma.

The therapy is now a potential option for people whose multiple myeloma no longer responds to existing treatments.

During CAR T-cell therapy, doctors take immune cells from a patient’s body, reprogram them so that they have a heightened ability to identify and eliminate cancer cells, and return these cells to the body through an IV. It is an involved and complex process but typically eliminates the need for additional cancer treatments for 12 months or more.

“A greater than 90% response rate is almost unheard of, as is the fact that the responses are durable,” said Nishi N. Shah, MD, MBBS, Attending Oncology Physician, Montefiore Einstein Comprehensive Cancer Center, and Assistant Professor, Oncology and Medicine, Albert Einstein College of Medicine. “These response rates are very impressive given that these are heavily pretreated patients. That’s really the best part.”

“It’s not just our team in hematologic malignancies that understands CAR T-cell therapy,” Dr. Shah said. “Physicians in the Department of Neurology and other specialties are involved, and our ICU staff has already been specifically trained, so patients are being taken care of by a set of providers who have dealt with the unique side effects related to CAR T-cell therapy such as cytokine release syndrome and neurotoxicity. That’s a real advantage for patients.”

“The advances in treatments for multiple myeloma are strikingly improving survival and quality of life,” added Dennis L. Cooper, MD, Chief, Bone Marrow Transplantation, Montefiore Einstein Comprehensive Cancer Center, and Professor, Oncology, Albert Einstein College of Medicine. “Although we don’t have a cure yet, many of us are genuinely optimistic that there may be one in the next five to 10 years. CAR T-Cell therapy is going to help patients get there.”