A year in review: Expert voices on the developments that defined 2025

2025 was a pivotal year in lymphoma. Several T-cell directed therapies have been established in relapsed/refractory lymphoma. All of the approval to date are in the third-line setting or later. Similar to how monoclonal antibodies improved responses and survival in numerous lymphoma subtypes, we all hope that that the bispecific antibodies will deliver similar benefits to patients affected with lymphoma. The promise is no more exemplified in follicular lymphoma. Within the span of a calendar year, we had two new approvals in second-line follicular lymphoma. The inMIND study, which evaluated the addition of the CD19 monoclonal antibody, tafasitamab, to the previously approved combination of lenalidomide and rituximab. At this recent ASH 2025 meeting, data was presented which has supported another approval in this space. The EPCORE FL-1 trial, randomized patients to R2 vs. epcoritamab-R2. This study indicated that the addition of the CD20/C3 bispecific antibody, epcoritamab, to rituximab and lenalidomide could potentially establish a new standard given the dramatic improvement in remission duration as compared to the R2 regimen.

Dr Tycel Phillips

City of Hope Cancer Center Duarte, CA, USA

In the realm of myeloid malignancies and germline predisposition, 2025 has set a watershed thanks to the release of new indications to allotransplant for myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) by the European Group for Blood and Marrow Transplantation (EBMT). Such update has been eagerly awaited by the entire hematological community as MDS are now well defined from a molecular standpoint and thus indication for the only curative approach to it should follow accordingly molecular-based classifiers and scores. Speaking about scores and treatment indications, a very recent study released the very first risk assessment tool for an inherited leukemia syndrome, namely DDX41-mutant MDS/AML. This is a milestone as no other familial leukemia has a dedicated risk score tool and this represents a huge advancement in the field.

 Dr Carmelo Gurnari

Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, OH, USA
University of Tor Vergata, Rome, Italy

The myeloproliferative neoplasms (MPN) research field continues to develop deeper understanding of disease biology revealing new therapeutic targets such as MEIS1 and with refined appreciation of clinical and biological outcomes of selective targeting of mutant CALR. The MPN community needs to validate biomarkers of disease modification as we aim to evaluate novel agents and combination therapies for the next generation of drug approvals.

Dr John Mascarenas

Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York City, NY, USA

Teclistamab–daratumumab has redefined early-relapse multiple myeloma care with unprecedented response depth, progression-free survival and trend for overall survival, while pirtobrutinib marks a new era in frontline CLL/SLL therapy, outperforming chemoimmunotherapy in both efficacy and tolerability.

Prof Meletios-Athanasios Dimopoulos

National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece