Prognostically significant cytotoxic T cell clones are stimulated after thalidomide therapy in patients with multiple myeloma

Abstract

The expanded T cell clones are associated with a prolonged survival in patients with multiple myeloma. We sought to confirm this prognostic significance in a multicenter patient cohort and investigate the effect of thalidomide on clones and T regulatory cells (T_regs). Blood was collected from 120 patients enrolled in a Phase III trial of maintenance therapy ± thalidomide after autologous stem cell transplantation. TCR Vβ repertoire analysis identified T cell expansions in 48% of patients pre-transplant and 68% after 8-month maintenance. T cell expansions, previously shown to be clonal, were predominantly CD8 + (93%) and all 24 TCR Vβ families tested were represented. Thalidomide therapy was associated with a significant increase in the incidence of patients with multiple expansions (49% vs. 23%; χ² = 6.8; p = 0.01). The presence of expansions regardless of therapy was associated with a significantly longer median progression free survival (PFS) (32.1 vs. 17.6 months; χ² = 5.6; p = 0.02) and overall survival (OS) (χ² = 3.9; p < 0.05). Median PFS in the thalidomide arm was 50.9 months for patients with expansions and 28.3 months for patients without expansions (χ² = 19.4; p = 0.0002). Thalidomide did not appear to modulate T_reg numbers. Expanded T cell clones are prognostically significant and have an impact on progression after thalidomide therapy in a proportion of patients.

Keywords:

• Multiple myeloma
• T cell
• thalidomide
• clones
• prognosis

Acknowledgment

The authors are grateful to the 15 different ALLG trial centers who contributed blood samples.

Declaration of interest: The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the paper.