I was on my 12 month appointment with the doctor today. Everything looks good. There was just a small thing; he showed me a graph displaying BCR-ABL level (which has gone down good), but also a ”GUS-sensitivity” curve which had gone up slightly. He didnt sound too concerned yet but mentioned that if it continues to rise we may consider switching from Imatinib to another TKI. It seems I’m a bit sensitive to Imatinib he said?
Anyone knows what ”GUS-sensitivity” really is?
So I got my 12 month PCR result back. Results so far had been:
0 months: 114%
3 months: 12.7%
6 months: 1.3%
9 months: 0.19%
It was looking so good and I was hoping to get below 0.1% at 12 months. Unfortunately it came in as a disappointing increase to 0.47%.
Doctor has written ”GUS sensitivity is down more now”, and they have increased my Imatinib dose to 600mg. New test in 3 months and they mention they will put me on another TKI if PCR hasn’t dropped by then.
- Any comments on the switch to 600mg Imatinib? Is this common?
- Strange that I can find very little information about what this ”GUS sensitivity” is and what value you are supposed to have.
- Should I be concerned about the increase?
I got this explained from my doctor today.
”GUS sensitivity” in the lab report is just how good the lab did in analysing tests that day.
There are variations when analysing batches of PCR-tests. ”GUS sensitivity” tells the doctors how exact they could consider the test result to be. It will vary from time to time even from the same lab.
