ABSTRACT
In the absence of significant improvements in conventional chemotherapy (CC), high-dose therapy (HDT) with autologous stem cell transplantation (ASCT) has been increasingly used in the past 15 years in multiple myeloma (MM).1 Non-randomized studies have shown that for patients responding to initial induction chemotherapy, ASCT is a safe (less than 5% toxic deaths) and effective consolidation therapy.2 Notably, some of these studies have suggested that 30-50% complete remissions (CRs) could be achieved with this approach in newly diagnosed MM and, more importantly, tumor burden reduction could be converted into a prolongation of remission and of survival.2 However, these pilot studies are difficult to analyze because the recruitment of patients is subject to selection bias regarding age, performance status, renal function, and response to initial chemotherapy. Blade et al.3
