How long does someone live with myelofibrosis?

How long does someone live with myelofibrosis?

So it could be as long as a couple of decades. And as short as a couple of years. And so what we do is take a person's entire blood counts. We look at mutations, we look at fibrosis in the bone marrow, and we put these in risk calculators to see what are the estimates for overall survival. And that really helps us formulate our treatment plans. Because if you have a higher risk of progressing to acute leukemia and lower chance of survival in five years, we're more likely to take risks like suggesting an allogeneic stem cell transplant. But if you're going to be alive for 20 years, then we're probably not willing to take those risks. And we can consider something like just symptom management.

There are some patients that have this diagnosis, have normal blood counts, feel well, and we just monitor them. And then there are some patients, and unfortunately are on the other end of the spectrum, have really abnormal blood counts, a lot of symptoms. And we have to pursue more aggressive maneuvers like a stem cell transplant or treatments. And some patients may need treatment really quickly, but then a matter of weeks to months.