Graft Versus Host Disease

The Prescription Drug User Fee Act action date is Aug. 28, 2024.

In this concluding segment of a four-part series, Sophie Paczesny, M.D., Ph.D., of the Hollings Cancer Center of the Medical University of South Carolina and an expert on graft-versus-host disease biomarkers, discusses the future of biomarkers as companion diagnostics.

Biomarkers may help identify acute graft-versus-host disease patients who could be treated with alternatives to corticosteroids.

Biomarkers can be used for many purposes — diagnosis, prognosis, projections for success of a treatment. Sophie Paczesny, M.D., Ph.D., a professor at the Hollings Cancer Center at the Medical University of South Carolina and an internationally recognized expert on biomarkers for graft-versus-host disease (GvHD), reviews a typology of biomarkers that groups them into five subtypes and discusses their use in GVHD.

What is a biomarker? Sophie Paczesny, M.D., Ph.D., a professor at the Hollings Cancer Center at the Medical University of South Carolina and an internationally recognized expert on biomarkers for graft-versus-host disease (GvHD), explains.

Results reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology suggest filtering naïve T cells from peripheral blood stem cell transplants may decrease the risk of chronic graft-versus-host-disease. An accompanying editorial says a randomized trial is needed to provide definitive proof.

This is the fourth approval for Jakafi, a JAK1/JAK2 inhibitor.