Long-term follow-up in patients treated with Mini-BEAM as salvage therapy for relapsed or refractory Hodgkin's...

Several studies have focused on investigation of the optimal salvage regimen to induce maximum response before autologous stem cell transplantation (ASCT) in patients with relapsed or refractory Hodgkin's disease (HD). However, in most of these studies, the follow-up is relatively short. In the present study, we report on long-term results of 55 consecutive patients with HD who received Mini-BEAM [BCNU (carmustine), etoposide, cytarabine, melphalan] as salvage therapy before ASCT. Eleven patients were refractory to front-line therapy, 17 were partial responders, and 27 patients had relapsed from HD. Twenty-eight patients achieved complete response, and 18 achieved partial response with a median of two cycles of Mini-BEAM, giving a total response rate of 84%. Significant factors predicting poor response (P < 0.05) were: initial treatment with MOPP (mechloroethamine, oncovin, procarbazine, prednisolone), > or = two previous chemotherapy regimens and three disease characteristics at Mini-BEAM treatment: presence of B symptoms, extranodal involvement or low serum albumin. However, only the last two factors retained independent influence on multivariate analysis. In total, 45/55 patients have been transplanted. Median follow-up after Mini-BEAM administration for living patients is 68 months. At the time of reporting, 31 out of 55 patients (56.4%) are still alive, 21 patients (38%) have relapsed, three (5.4%) have developed secondary neoplasias, and five have died of other complications not related to disease progression. The actuarial 7-year overall survival (OS) was 52%, the progression-free survival (PFS) 54% and the event-free survival (EFS) 36%. The response to Mini-BEAM was the most important prognostic factor for predicting the long-term probability of surviving the disease: none of the eight patients who did not respond to Mini-BEAM were alive at 3 years. On multivariate analysis, response to Mini-BEAM and extranodal involvement before Mini-BEAM had a significant influence on OS. Our results show the safety and efficacy of Mini-BEAM before ASCT for refractory or relapsed HD patients.