Dr. Alkharabsheh on Novel Agents Under Exploration in Myelofibrosis

Omar Alkharabsheh, MD, an assistant professor of interdisciplinary clinical oncology at the USA College of Medicine, as well as a medical oncologist and hematologist with Mitchell Cancer Institute, USA Health, discusses novel agents in the field of myelofibrosis.

Ropeginterferon alfa-2b is now in development and is being explored in European clinical trials for patients with myelofibrosis, says Alkharabsheh. This agent was also compared with hydroxyurea in a phase 3 trial. Results showed durable responses and noninferior hematologic response with ropeginterferon alfa-2b; however, the agent was not able to induce a significant reduction in spleen size, adds Alkharabsheh.

Additionally, patients who progress on JAK2 inhibitors need to be treated in clinical trials, as there are still no acceptable options for them, adds Alkharabsheh. Most of those clinical trials require that participants have good platelet counts. Although after receiving a JAK2 inhibitor or upon disease progression, patients will often experience thrombocytopenia that limits their options in terms of clinical trials.

The field has another JAK2 inhibitor called momelotinib (Inrebic), which is still in clinical trials, but the unique quality is that the drug demonstrated improvement with regard to anemia and reduced transfusion dependency in patients with myelofibrosis, concludes Alkharabsheh.