Our patient is a 67-year-old white man, who works as a teacher in a small city. He does not smoke tobacco; he has a history of arterial hypertension grade I to II and coronary heart disease. His mother died from myocardial infarction due to occlusive coronary artery disease. He was diagnosed as having CML in 2006. The treatment was initially started with imatinib (Glivec, Novartis) 400 mg administered orally once daily. Imatinib 400 to 800 mg per day was taken for 53 months. He lost major molecular response (MMR) and imatinib therapy was replaced with dasatinib 100 mg orally administered once daily and after 6 months MMR was achieved. He was also using torasemide 20 mg orally administered once daily and metoprolol succinate 50 mg orally administered once daily. In April 2015 he developed increasing dyspnea on exertion, fatigue, and peripheral edema. He consulted his family physician, and a chest X-ray was done, confirming pleural effusion. On admission his heart rate was 97 beats per minute and blood pressure was 143/90 mmHg. Fever was not present. He presented with peripheral edema and diminished breath sounds. Pleural friction rub was present. Deformity of the spine accompanied by lower back pain was noted during neurological check-up. The pleural fluid was drawn out several times via thoracentesis (1.5 to 2 liters of exudate in total) but cytological analysis excluded malignancy, a GeneXpert® tuberculosis test of a bronchial smear was also negative, therefore, the pleural effusion was suspected to be caused by congestive heart failure. A complete blood count was normal, but his creatinine levels were elevated (Tables and ). Over the course of the next 4 months his general condition deteriorated as he experienced multiple recurrences of pleural effusion requiring drainage of the built-up fluid (Table ). Dasatinib therapy was stopped in September 2015 after 42 months of treatment. A coronarography was done in September 2015; it did not reveal any hemodynamically important stenosis in his coronary arteries, thereby excluding coronary artery disease. An echocardiogram showed right ventricular dilation, estimated right ventricle systolic pressure of 125 mmHg, and severe tricuspid regurgitation suggesting PH.\nRHC performed on 12 October 2015 revealed severe PAH with mPAP of 53 mmHg and normal left ventricle diastolic pressure (Table ). A computed tomography scan confirmed the absence of pulmonary embolism; laboratory specific tests for HIV, rheumatoid factor, and anti-nuclear antibodies (ANA) were negative and dasatinib-induced PAH was diagnosed. The 6-minute walk test (6MWT) distance was limited to 165 m (Table ). He started PAH-targeted treatment with sildenafil 20 mg × 3 orally administered and restarted CML therapy with imatinib 400 mg orally administered daily on 19 October 2015.\nHis condition rapidly improved, a check-up RHC done a month later showed mPAP of 34 mmHg, decreased pulmonary vascular resistance, and increased cardiac output values (Table ). His 6MWT score was 2.1 times higher (Table ). Echocardiography done in February 2016 revealed right ventricle systolic pressure of 50 mmHg; a complete blood count and biochemistry showed no abnormalities (Tables and ). He has been asymptomatic since, but treatment for PAH with sildenafil is still necessary. The last hematological check-up was in January 2017, he was still on imatinib 400 mg daily and had normal complete blood count and MMR (BRA-ABL was negative).
A 63-year-old man presented to our department with exertional dyspnoea. He had a 2-year history of dyspnoea that had worsened over the previous 6 months. He had also been diagnosed with CML at the age of 55, for which a first-generation TKI, imatinib (400 mg daily), was prescribed as his first-line therapy. However, since this caused facial oedema and massive pleural effusion, a second-generation TKI, dasatinib (100 mg daily), was chosen as his second-line therapy 5 years before presentation. Concomitant pleural effusion and anaemia was thought to have caused the dyspnoea 2 years prior to presentation; subsequently, an additional dose of diuretics and a reduced dose of dasatinib (50 mg daily) resulted in a transient improvement of dyspnoea following a decrease in the amount of pleural effusion and a slight increase in haemoglobin without further evaluation.\nElectrocardiography (Figure ) and transthoracic echocardiography (TTE) (Figure , Table ) on admission indicated severe right ventricular pressure overload. Physical examination showed jugular vein dilatation. His lung sounds were normal, but cardiac auscultation revealed increased intensity of the P2 sound. The liver was slightly enlarged, but splenomegaly was unclear. Laboratory data showed markedly elevated brain natriuretic peptide (442 pg/mL; normal reference value, <18.4 pg/mL), and anti-nuclear and anti-centromere antibody positivity (1280X and 166X, respectively). Contrast-enhanced chest computed tomography showed no evidence of pulmonary embolism, and perfusion-ventilation scintigraphy showed no evidence of segmental mismatch. Neither abdominal ultrasonography nor upper endoscopy showed clear evidence of portal hypertension. Right heart catheterization (RHC) confirmed markedly increased mean pulmonary artery pressure (MPAP; 67 mmHg; normal reference value, ≤20 mmHg) and pulmonary vascular resistance [PVR; 23.5 wood units (WU); normal reference value, ≤3 WU3] on room air (Table ). Because the patient presented with Raynaud’s phenomenon and nail fold bleeding, a skin biopsy was performed. Pathological findings included increased collagen fibres in subcutaneous adipose tissue and the dermis, increased mucin deposits between collagen fibres, and infiltration of inflammatory cells (mainly lymphocytes) around vessels, supporting a diagnosis of scleroderma. Neither DASA-PAH nor scleroderma-associated PAH (SSc-PAH) could be defined as the primary cause of PAH.\nBased on these findings, we simultaneously discontinued dasatinib and started initial combination therapy with the pulmonary vasodilators, tadalafil (40 mg daily), macitentan (10 mg daily), and selexipag (1.2 mg twice daily). RHC 1 month later showed improvement of the patient’s MPAP and PVR to 35 mmHg and 5.7 WU, respectively (Table ), with his 6-min walk distance also improving from 20 m to 490 m. RHC at 3 months demonstrated further improvement of MPAP and PVR to 33 mmHg and 3.9 WU, respectively. Serial TTEs performed at 1 and 3 months also revealed improved right ventricular pressure overload (Figure and C, Table ). At 4 months, as the Philadelphia chromosome became detectable, TKI administration with imatinib (300 mg daily) was resumed at a lower dose than previously prescribed. At 1 year, MPAP and PVR improved to reasonable values of 18 mmHg and 1.3 WU, respectively. We then withdrew selexipag from the treatment regimen without any evidence of clinical worsening.