Donor-cell myelodysplastic syndrome developing 13 years after marrow grafting for aplastic anemia

Donor-cell-derived hematopoietic malignancy is a rare event after bone marrow transplantation. Most cases in the literature occurred within the first year. We present a rare case of a female patient who had a bone marrow transplant for severe aplastic anemia (SAA) at the age of two and a half years from her human leukocyte antigen-identical brother. She developed a myelodysplastic syndrome (refractory cytopenia with multilineage dysplasia) 12 years later. Initially, the malignant clone was of recipient origin, but within several months, progression to a clinically more aggressive refractory anemia with excess blasts (RAEB) was accompanied by the outgrowth of a new clone of donor origin. In this report we provide evidence proving that the patient's final malignant clone arose in donor cells: cytogenetic analysis of the marrow showed a male karyotype and a t(3;21)(q26;q21) in all 62 metaphases analyzed. Interphase fluorescence in situ hybridization showed that all identifiable cells contained the Y chromosome. We conclude that donor-cell-derived hematopoietic malignancy after bone marrow transplantation can occur even after many years. We believe that the 13 years that elapsed between the transplant and the development of RAEB in our case represent the longest latency period in the literature.