How Do You Know If You Have Multiple Myeloma?

BlackDoctor.org's "Ask the Expert" series brings the nation's leading health experts directly to viewers. In this video, Dr. Craig Cole, Hematologist and Assistant Professor at University of Michigan, discusses multiple myeloma.

Transcript

The first tests are a blood test and a urine test. A blood test to look for the protein that myeloma produces. And so, that test can either be a total blood protein level - which should be elevated in myeloma, or the more specific test is the serum protein electrophoresis, or the S-PEP. So, if you ask for an S-PEP that is one test for myeloma. And then there's a urine test which looks for protein in the urine.

And so, those are the two tests that we use to screen for myeloma. The diagnosis is ultimately made by a bone marrow biopsy, looking at the plasma cells inside the bone marrow or the blood factor.