Deferasirox (Exjade®) significantly improves cardiac T2* in heavily iron-overloaded patients with β-thalassemia major

Anil Pathare, Ali Taher, Shahina Daar*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

50 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Noninvasive measurement of tissue iron levels can be assessed using T2* magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to identify and monitor patients with iron overload. This study monitored cardiac siderosis using T2* MRI in a cohort of 19 heavily iron-overloaded patients with β-thalassemia major receiving iron chelation therapy with deferasirox over an 18-month period. Overall, deferasirox therapy significantly improved mean ± standard deviation cardiac T2* from a baseline of 17.2±10.8 to 21.5±12.8 ms (+25.0%; P=0.02). A concomitant reduction in median serum ferritin from a baseline of 5,497 to 4,235 ng/mL (-23.0%; P=0.001), and mean liver iron concentration from 24.2±9.0 to 17.6± 12.9 mg Fe/g dry weight (-27.1%; P=0.01) was also seen. Improvements were seen in patients with various degrees of cardiac siderosis, including those patients with a baseline cardiac T2* of <10 ms, indicative of high cardiac iron burden. These findings therefore support previous observations that deferasirox is effective in the removal of myocardial iron with concomitant reduction in total body iron.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)405-409
Number of pages5
JournalAnnals of Hematology
Volume89
Issue number4
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Apr 2010

Keywords

  • Iron chelation
  • Iron overload
  • Magnetic resonance imaging
  • Myocardial iron
  • T2*
  • β-thalassemia

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Hematology

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