Abstract 272: Evidence of decreased prevalence of the t(11;14) translocation in black patients with multiple myeloma: A multi-center study

Proceedings: AACR Annual Meeting 2014; April 5-9, 2014; San Diego, CA The incidence of multiple myeloma (MM) is twice as high in blacks compared with whites. MM consists of several different cytogenetic subtypes, with differing presentations, response to therapy, and prognosis. The studies that have characterized the distribution of the primary cytogenetic abnormalities by fluorescence in-situ hybridization (FISH) testing have been primarily conducted in white populations, and more data are needed on whether the distribution of these cytogenetic abnormalities differs in black compared with white MM patients, and to determine if the increased prevalence of MM in blacks is related to specific subtypes of the disease. In this multi-center study, we examined four common clinically assessed cytogenetic subtypes (t(11;14), t(4;14), del13q, and del17p) at time of MM diagnosis in 245 black patients from 3 clinics who had prior FISH testing available in medical records. We compared the prevalence of these subtypes with our previously characterized Mayo Clinic cohort which was all Caucasian (n=484). The t(11;14) translocation was seen in 9 of 245 (4%) black patients with MM; this was significantly lower than the rate of t(11;14) translocations seen in white patients from Mayo Clinic (18%), p < 0.0001). In contrast to t(11;14), the prevalence of the t(4;14) translocation across the two groups was similar (p= 0.92). We conclude that the prevalence of t(11;14) translocation is significantly lower in blacks with myeloma compared with whites. Our findings suggest that the distribution of cytogenetic subtypes found in MM may differ significantly by race, and further studies assessing differences in the prevalence of other primary cytogenetic abnormalities such as trisomies, t(6;14), t(14;16), and t(14;20) are needed. Furthermore, these results support the hypothesis previously put forth that there are several different subtypes of multiple myeloma that may be defined by the major cytogenetic translocations. Since these results differ from those previously reported (Baker et al 2013, Blood), we are conducting further analyses of these data to examine possible factors that could account for the differential association of translocation by race, including probes used. Citation Format: Alexandra Joelle Greenberg, Sunita Philip, Agne Paner, Sylvia Velinova, Ashraf Badros, Rosalind Catchatorian, Dirk Larson, Rhett Ketterling, Robert A. Kyle, Shaji Kumar, Celine M. Vachon, S. Vincent Rajkumar. Evidence of decreased prevalence of the t(11;14) translocation in black patients with multiple myeloma: A multi-center study. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 105th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2014 Apr 5-9; San Diego, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2014;74(19 Suppl):Abstract nr 272. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2014-272