The MDS Beacon™

Myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) is nearly five times more common than previously estimated, according to research from the John Theurer Cancer Center in Hackensack, New Jersey. The study, published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, also found that MDS patients have significantly more serious complications, shorter survival, and incur higher medical payments than the general Medicare population.

“Patients with MDS are at increased risk of developing heart disease, diabetes, and infections, compared to their age matched peers.  Thus the total financial cost of caring for patients with MDS is more than the average Medicare patient,” said Dr. Stuart Goldberg, chief of the Division of Leukemia at the John Theurer Cancer Center, in an email to The MDS Beacon.

In their study, researchers analyzed files for more than 1 million Medicare recipients older than 65 years from both hospitals and private practices. They identified 45,000 new cases of MDS in 2003. This approximation is almost five times higher than the National Cancer Institute’s previous estimates of 10,300.

Researchers found that MDS patients had considerably higher rates of heart problems (73.2 percent), diabetes (40 percent), blood infection (22.5 percent), and shortness of breath (49.4 percent) compared to the rest of the Medicare population during a three-year follow-up period. 

The three-year overall survival was also lower for MDS patients (60 percent) compared to their peers (84.7 percent).

MDS patients who received regular red blood cell transfusions had higher rates of complications, increased rates of progression to acute myeloid leukemia, and lower overall survival than transfusion-independent MDS patients.

The study also showed that MDS is costly, as the 2003 median Medicare payment for MDS patients was $16,181, compared to $1,575 for the general Medicare population.

Although the research may be slightly overestimated due to coding errors in the Medicare system, researchers concluded that MDS is more common than previously estimated.

“Since MDS is more common and expensive than previously realized, I hope our trial will encourage the National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Corrections and other research funders to pay attention to this disease,” said Dr. Goldberg. “Specifically I would like to find out if the adoption of treatment has decreased the complication rates of MDS and/or lengthened survival.”

For more information, see the Journal of Clinical Oncology (abstract).