Ruben Mesa, MD from the Mayo Clinic, Phoenix, AZ discusses updates to the Phase III PERSIST-1 trial of pacritinib for myelofibrosis presented at the American Society of Oncology (ASCO) 2016 Annual Meeting held in Chicago, IL. Pacritinib is an oral JAK2/FLT3 inhibitor and the PERSIST-1 study (NCT01773187) looks at pacritinib vs best alternative therapy in patients who are JAK inhibitor naive and could have any platelet count at trial entry. Dr Mesa talks about the long-term data, which show improvements in splenomegaly and symptoms. He further discusses the concerns around the safety of the drug, in particular the number of patients passing away during the study. According to Dr Mesa, the analysis of the data seems to suggest that this is due to adverse patient selection.