Screening for AL Amyloidosis in Smoldering Multiple Myeloma

In this multicenter study, we will recruit 400 patients 40 years of age or older at 15 centers with a diagnosis of smoldering multiple myeloma (SMM), a group of patients for whom standard of care is observation not treatment. The main goal of this study is to screen for the diagnosis of light-chain amyloidosis (AL) before the onset of symptomatic disease and to develop a training set for a likelihood algorithm.

This study is based on results from two prior studies in which 4 of 36 patients with SMM and none of 14 patients with MGUS were found to have AL. The hypothesis that we test with this protocol is that patients with (1) a pre-existing diagnosis of SMM, (2) free light chain (FLC) abnormalities, (3) IGLV genes associated with AL,(4) t(11;14) or gain 1q, and (5) NT-proBNP \> 332pg/mL will have undiagnosed AL or risk of progression to AL. We will study the potential for SMM, the FLC screen, AL-related IGLV gene use, t(11;14) or gain 1q cytogenetic abnormalities, and NT-proBNP \> 332pg/mL to be the variables in a likelihood algorithm for AL.