Transcript:

This week's "Ask Dr. Durie" comes from a patient who has heard about a new development, which is that instead of Revlimid from the BMS/Celgene company, there is generic lenalidomide available as a possible alternative.

And so, the answer to this patient is that indeed this is the case. There is an 888 number to the company that is releasing this generic, the TEVA company, and information can be obtained by calling this number and going through the alerts to learn about different details of the generic form of the lenalidomide.

Now at this point, we're waiting to learn a lot more about this. For example, can your doctor write to give you Revlimid or the generic? Or will there be some pressure to do one or the other? It seems that for now at least the doctor can write for whichever your doctor wants to prescribe—the Revlimid or the generic, and also the patient can decide—so, this is very good news.

What we're all waiting to learn in full detail is what will be the cost of the generic lenalidomide versus the Revlimid? So, there's a possibility that there could be an important cost-saving.

As of this moment, as of this video, we don't have enough information to guide you on that particular point. However, it's good to know that there is this choice emerging and hopefully, it can be a helpful backup. We are posting information about generic lenalidomide on our drug reimbursement assistance page on the IMF (International Myeloma Foundation) site.

So right now, I would encourage you to track that. As soon as additional information is available about the generic lenalidomide, it will be posted there, and I will do a follow-up Ask Dr. Durie because there have been quite a lot of questions about this new development.