Leukemia patients may not need marrow transplant: Study
LONDON: Leukemia patients who have blood stem cell transplants survive just as long on average as those who undergo the more invasive procedure of having a bone marrow transplant, scientists said yesterday. But patients with acute forms of the blood cancer appear to do better if they have bone marrow as opposed to blood stem cell transplants, the scientists said, suggesting that for some the benefit of the complex treatment is greater in the long run.
Ten-year survival rates after allogeneic stem-cell transplant in leukemia patients were the same whether the cells came from donors' bone marrow or peripheral blood.
Among 329 patients participating in the trial, overall survival was 49.1 percent for those receiving peripheral blood progenitor cell transplants versus 56.5 percent among those receiving bone marrow transplants, according to the report published online in Lancet Oncology.
There was also no significant difference over the long term in performance status, ability to work, hematopoietic function, development of bronchiolitis obliterans, or secondary malignancy rates.
Reuters-Lancet Oncology
(China Daily 02/02/2010 page10)
