Does losing weight or avoiding weight gain decrease the risk of myeloma?
Not gaining weight in the first place is ideal, but obviously that's not the case for everyone.
If somebody is overweight or obese and they have a diagnosis or they want to prevent their diagnosis, I think losing weight, the data is not as strong because it's just harder to study long term, but whatever data is there, it does show that it decreases the risk.
In myeloma, there are two studies. One showed that sustained BMI elevation, so BMI elevation between the ages of 25 and 30 years. So in young adulthood and then just before diagnosis is associated, the higher risk 1.7 times compared to just BMI elevation at any one of those time points. And similarly, weight cycling is not good.
Weight gain and then weight loss and then weight gain again and weight loss that also is associated with an increased risk of development of myeloma to a 1.7 times.
At the same time, I must say one thing is that once a diagnosis of myeloma is met, being underweight is also associated with worse outcomes.
And that's probably related to the unintentional weight loss
For some patients with diagnosis healthful nutrition, I think is important to try to maintain the weight.
HealthTree • April 2, 2026