[Greg H]

Hey Lynn!

Congratulations on your great response -- and for posting here to remind us about valproic acid.

When I read Lynn's post last night, I used the marrowforums feature that allows you to search for all posts by a particular person to figure out we were talking about valproic acid -- that made me recall earlier posts and some reading I had done on it.

I went Googling and found a couple of interesting articles, but then I thought: "Why not search marrowforums?" Once I realized it was an HDAC inhibitor, I thought I remembered a post from Birgitta on that topic.

Well, lo and behold, there wasn't just one post; there were dozens -- from Birgitta and plenty of other folks too. That search saved me tons of time tracking down stuff. The search function is an incredibly valuable aspect of marrowforums. I've been hanging around here more than a year and it's the first time I had really made use of it. Highly recommended.

The search reinforced a lesson that I think many of us have learned: the current treatments for MDS are kind of like mending china with a sledgehammer -- or maybe hunting mosquitoes with a shotgun.

The trials of valproic acid cast such a wide net that they record a response, but offer little enlightenment on which patients will be helped by this particular therapy, as opposed to one of the others. As Neil remarked the other day, MDS research is still in its infancy in terms of teasing out the various types and the therapies appropriate for each.

Until the research gets some of that nailed down, most of us are left with a handful of possible therapies and little choice other than to pick one and see if it pans out. All the more reason for folks to sign up for clinical trials.

Take care all -- and thanks much, Lynn! Congrats!

Greg