Adoptive cellular therapy using chimeric antigen receptor T-cell (CART) therapy is currently being evaluated in patients with relapsed / refractory multiple myeloma (MM). The majority of CAR-T cell programs now being tested in clinical trials are targeting B-cell maturation antigen. Several recent phase I / II trials show promising preliminary results in patients with MM progressing on proteasome inhibitors, immunomodulatory drugs and monoclonal antibodies targeting CD38. CAR-T cell therapy is a potentially life-threatening strategy that can only be administered in experienced centers. For the moment, CAR-T cell therapy for MM is still experimental, but once this strategy has been approved in relapsed/refractory MM, it will become one of the most important indications for this therapy in Europe and world-wide. This manuscript proposes practical considerations for the use of CAR-T cell therapy in MM, and discusses several important issues for its future development.

Department of Hematology Catholic University of Leuven Leuven Belgium

Erasmus Medical Center Rotterdam the Netherlands

Fundação Champalimaud Lisbon Portugal

Hospital Clinic de Barcelona Barcelona Spain

Karolinska Institutet Stockholm Sweden

Leeds Institute of Cancer and Pathology University of Leeds Leeds UK

Università di Torino Azienda Ospedaliera San Giovanni Torino taly

Universitätsklinikum Heidelberg Heidelberg Germany

University Athens School of Medicine Athens Greece

University Hospital Hôtel Dieu Nantes France

University Hospital Hurriez Lille France

University of Navarra Navarra Spain

University of Ostrava Ostrava Czech Republic

University of Salamanca Salamanca Spain

University of Wurzburg Wurzburg Germany

Wilhelminen Cancer Research Institute Wilhelminen Austria

Haematologica. 2019 Dec;104(12):2335-2336. doi: 10.3324/haematol.2019.228676. PubMed

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