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What is Multiple Myeloma?
Multiple myeloma is a hematologic malignancy that originates from plasma cells, a type of white blood cell produced in the bone marrow. Normal plasma cells are responsible for producing antibodies against infection, while cancerous plasma cells—myeloma cells—proliferate in the bone marrow, causing the patient to be unable to live a normal life and suffer from symptoms such as anemia, bone pain, fractures, decreased immunity, and hypercalcemia. symptoms, proteinuria, and renal insufficiency. The incidence of multiple myeloma is about 2 in 100,000, and it is considered the second most common malignant tumor of the blood. It commonly occurs in middle-aged and elderly people, with a high incidence in the 50-65 age group. In recent years, the age of onset has tended to be earlier. The incidence rate of men is more than that of women, with a male to female ratio of 1.6:1. With the increase of age, the incidence of multiple myeloma will also increase, which has constituted more and more serious harm to people's life and quality of life.
So can middle and late-staged multiple myeloma be treated? Minimally invasive techniques with less side effects and less trauma can help multiple myeloma patients avoid surgical resection, avoid suffering from traditional radiotherapy and chemotherapy, effectively prolong survival and improve quality of life.
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What are the symptoms of multiple myeloma?
Misdiagnosis rate of multiple myeloma reaches up to 40% to 50%, so the following are symptoms caused misdiagnosis:
Infection: patients are prone to develop respiratory tract infection or urinary tract infections. In advanced stage, infection is one of the main causes of death.
Anemia: it can be caused because the normal function of bone marrow in patients with multiple myeloma is restrained.
Skeletal symptoms: bone pain, local mass, fracture and even paraplegia, etc.
Hypercalcemia vomiting, weakness, confusion of consciousness, polyuria or constipation, etc can appear.
Blood hyperviscosity: dizziness, blurred vision, tinnitus, and sudden occurrence of consciousness disturbance, numbness of the fingers, etc can be caused.
Renal inadequacy: patients are often accompanied by renal inadequacy when being diagnosed.
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What are the diagnostic methods of multiple myeloma?
Based on clinical findings, nearly two thirds of patients have been in advanced stage at the first time of diagnosis and many patients had been misdiagnosed before due to going to the inappropriate departments. Experts from Modern Cancer Hospital Guangzhou remind you that when those symptoms such as bone pain, anemia, renal inadequacy, repeated infections appear, you should go to the department of hematology for check, thus early detection can effectively control the further development of your condition.
Patients who are highly suspected of multiple myeloma should timely carry out examinations such as tests of immunoglobulin and Bene Jones protein (BJP), X-ray and bone marrow examination. Multiple sites of X-ray examination can do a significant help on diagnosis, through which, destruction area of multiple circular bones in different size (especially the skull, ribs, vertebrae, and pelvis) can be found. When necessary, MRI, CT can be done. MRI examination can help to judge whether there is spinal cord compression; CT examination is conducive to display extramedullary lesions. Sometimes, a wide range of osteoporosis can be the only one X-ray finding for myeloma. In addition, confirmation of diagnosing multiple myeloma needs multiple sits of puncture or bone marrow biopsy.
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