Bone marrow transplantation in 65 patients with severe aplastic anemia

This articles summarizes the experience of the Hospital Saint-Louis Bone Marrow Transplantation Team of bone marrow transplantation in severe aplastic anemia. Sixty-five consecutive patients have been transplanted with an HLA identical sibling marrow. Various conditioning regimen have been used. Conditioning regimen using high dose Cyclophosphamide alone or associated with Procarbazine and anti-thymocyte globulin gave a high number of bone marrow graft rejection. Therefore, a conditioning regimen using Cyclophosphamide and total body irradiation with lung shielding has been used for the last three years. This regimen suppressed bone marrow graft rejection. The main problems remain graft versus host disease and intercurrent infections. Despite these complications, 50 per cent of the patients become long term survivors and are apparently cured of their initial disease.