My name is Doctor Paul Richardson, and I serve as the clinical program leader and the director of clinical research at the Jerome Lipper Multiple Myeloma Center, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, Massachusetts.
We did a very comprehensive study of quality of life in patients in the DREAMM-8 study, which is a privilege to be part of. And at the same time, having shown that quality of life was not negatively impacted by belantamab, pomalidomide, dexamethasone, which was highly, significantly superior in terms of PFS benefit to the active control of pomalidomide, bortezomib, and dexamethasone.
We wanted in this study to show the ocular toxicity in no way impacted on quality of life in a meaningful way. And we were very gratified with this very comprehensive analysis of DREAMM-8 to show that quality of life was not actually impacted by the ocular toxicity.
This was a comprehensive assessment of three key parameters of quality of life. And at the same time to look at the treatment benefit over time. And we were very pleased to see that the belantamab, pomalidomide, dexamethasone group of patients consistently did better in terms of the quality of life measurement than the active control.
This difference, however, was not statistically significantly superior, but it showed clearly that the ocular toxicity did not adversely affect quality of life. So I think putting that all together, it was very reassuring to see that quality of life was preserved. And in fact, arguably enhanced with the benefit of treatment.
And that ocular toxicity in of itself did not impact adversely on quality of life and people may say, well, how on earth can that be? Well, I think the important message with the quality of life is that the degree of ocular toxicity from belantamab mafodotin was really remarkably limited. And I think whilst you can say that a number of patients were affected, its degree, its toxicity was actually remarkably mild and reversible.
So with that in mind, that's why the quality of life was not affected. And this is very reassuring to see this, because it added grist to the mill that the KVA grading that we use to prevent serious ocular toxicity really works. And the belantamab mafodotin at the same time has a manageable eye toxicity profile that is probably a lot milder than people realize.
And therefore, to have this quality of life measure to support that position, I think it's very helpful for patients and providers of life. So as we think about the ocular toxicity belantamab, I think it's very important to share with our audience that we've never seen permanent ocular toxicity and certainly never blindness, that the ocular toxicity we see is very mild to moderate.
What it involves is blurring of vision. It's almost like a little moisture in the eye. That's literally how my patients describe. And they're looking at a distant poster and they can see the large frame. But the small print may be a little bit difficult. And this is transient and passes sometimes in just a matter of hours or days. And with the use of eye drops, my experience with my patients is never painful.
It is and is never associated with serious complications like corneal perforation. We have never seen that in our practice of Dana-Farber, and we've treated over 170 patients. So we have a real good body of experience to say that with some certainty. And I think its reversibility with simple dose reduction and schedule change exemplifies the fact that this is a truly manageable side effect.
And I think that's very important to share with our audience that it's an off-the-shelf treatment approach, carefully monitored. That's the first four visits when you're getting belantamab mafodotin followed then by just regular checks. But no major interventions is incredibly important because apart from that, in my experience, belantamab is associated with very few serious side effects and I've personally never had to hospitalize a patient for belantamab toxicity ever so far, touchwood.
And so in that context, I would say this is a very well-tolerated approach to treating, you know, using BCMA as a targeted approach to therapy.
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HealthTree • December 19, 2025