Myeloma plateau or remission

Now that I had reached my first myeloma plateau stage people were asking “what is a plateau stage”?
When I was diagnosed with myeloma in 2001 myeloma was considered a cancer that had no cure. It was explained I would have treatment, recover, then enter a plateau stage. This would be followed by a relapse, more treatment, then another plateau stage. This cycle of treatment/plateau/relapse was to be my future with the plateau stage getting progressively shorter. Treatment was chemotherapy; Thalidomide was on the horizon, that was it.
Plateau was described as a stable stage of my disease following a good response to anti cancer treatment. The word remission was not used.
It is only in recent times that the word remission has been introduced into the myeloma vocabulary. Now it is:
CR = complete remission.
VGPR = very good partial remission.
PR = partial remission.
NR = no remission.
The advent of the new generation treatments Thalidomide, Velcade, Revlimid and their alphabet combinations VTD, RTD, VPM etc, etc have changed outcomes. Improved treatment responses means people are now living longer with myeloma.
With total therapy treatment now available CR is the expected outcome. If I was a participant of total therapy treatment I would be totally focused on CR and would be telling everyone my entire goal is CR. Plateau would not be used.
My reference to plateau stage is now being challenged by myeloma treatment moving forward, it is time for me to reassess.

Part 3 Plateau stage commencement

My retrospective myeloma blog continues.
Part 1 “The beginning” covering initial diagnose and treatment was completed July 2009: Link to summary of part 1 the beginning.
Part 2 ASCT was completed December 2009: Link to summary of part 2 ASCT for myeloma.
I now start Part 3; the first plateau stage.
Results from my 100 day post ASCT were all good, IgG had reduced to 10.3g/l (1030mg/dl) from 80g/L (8000mg/dl) at diagnose and 31g/L 3100mg/dl) prior to ASCT.
My health was good, I had made an excellent recovery, my plateau stage had commenced.
This continued relatively uneventful until September 2006 when over a short period of time a plasmacytoma grew in my left humerus and shattered the bone.
IgG levels were still down and it wasn’t until the end of 2007 that they started to increase. My relapse had begun.
What happened after that will be in Part 4 “the relapse”.
The word remission is now frequently used in relation to successful myeloma treatments. When I was first diagnosed the term remission was not used as it was considered the myeloma will return. More about my views on that in a future posting.