[Whole body irradiation before bone marrow transplantation]

Preliminary results of hiperfraccionated total body irradiation (TBI) in eleven patients with acute leukemia (mean age 11.4 years) as conditioning for allogeneic bone marrow transplantation are presented. The linear accelerator was always used for photon irradiation in 3 daily fractions of 120 cGy, to a total dose of 1320 cGy in 4 days. With a follow-up of 3-24 months we obtained good results. The average time for durable engraftment was 22 days and only 2 patients died; one early after the engraftment and another with hepatic veno-occlusive disease 4 months later. There were no cases of intersticial pneumonitis. Due to the good results, although the number of the patients was small, and the follow-up short, the authors propose to continue this protocol until November 1990.