Cancer Res Treat.  2007 Dec;39(4):171-174.

Clinical Value of New Staging Systems for Multiple Myeloma

• Choi JH
• Yoon JH
• Yang SK

Abstract

PURPOSE: We wanted to investigate the validity of the recently introduced Southwest Oncology Group (SWOG) staging system and the International Staging System (ISS) by comparing both systems with the widely accepted Durie/Salmon (DS) system for multiple myeloma patients.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
Between 1992 and 2005, 85 multiple myeloma patients (men: women 41:44, median age: 63 years (range: 36~87)) with available baseline values of albumin and beta2-microglobulin were enrolled. The clinical and laboratory data were retrospectively obtained.
RESULTS
According to the ISS, 11 patients were stage I (12.9%), 30 patients stage II (35.3%) and 44 patients stage III (51.8%). The median survivals of the ISS stages I, II and III were 78.6 months, 31.8 months and 15.1 months, respectively (p=0.015). The DS staging system was not able to predict the survival. For the SWOG staging system, 14 patients were stage I (16.4%), 27 patients stage II (31.8%), 27 patients stage III (31.8%) and 17 patients were stage IV (20.0%). The median survivals of the SWOG staging system stage I, II, III and IV were 78.6 months, 31.8 months, 11.6 months and 24.8 months, respectively (p=0.0075).
CONCLUSION
The ISS staging system showed better reliability, simplicity and predictability for survival than the DS and SWOG staging systems for multiple myeloma patients.

Keyword

Southwest Oncology Group staging system; International Staging System; Multiple myeloma

MeSH Terms

Female
Humans
Multiple Myeloma*
Retrospective Studies

Figure

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  Fig. 1 Overall survival of the 85 multiple myeloma patients according to the DS staging system (A), the SWOG staging system (B) and the ISS (C).

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