The Italian registry of therapeutic apheresis in SISTRA: Year of activity 2022

Therapeutic apheresis refers to a group of extracorporeal blood processing procedures used in the treatment of a variety of systemic diseases. These complex procedures are burdened by adverse reactions related to both procedures and underlying medical conditions. Given the importance of centralizing the collection and the analysis of information on therapeutic apheresis, the Italian National Blood Center (NBC), at the request of the Italian Scientific Society of Hemapheresis and Cell Manipulation (SIdEM), implemented the Italian Registry of Therapeutic Apheresis (IRTA) including it in the Information System of Transfusion Services (SISTRA), coordinated by the NBC. In 2022, a total of 34,702 therapeutic apheresis procedures was carried out in 8,781 patients, including paediatric patients, with an average of 3.9 procedures per patient. The 2022 IRTA data indicate that the patient with hematological and/or neurological disorders mainly turns to the apheresis centers. These results confirm the IRTA data from years 2020 and 2021. In the hematological field, the apheresis centers supply hematopoietic stem cells collection for autologous transplantation as well as mononuclear cell collection for extracorporeal photopheresis. With regard to the neurological field, myasthenia, chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy and Guillain-Barré syndrome along with other neurological pathologies related to immune disorders are the most treated. In conclusion, this manuscript presents 2022 activity data of IRTA providing institutions and scientific societies with a wide range of information including type and number of therapeutic procedures, adverse events and patients' outcome.