Intraosseous compared to intravenous infusion of allogeneic bone marrow

Thirty-eight patients (> or = 18 years) receiving marrow transplants from HLA-identical or one antigen-mismatched related donors were randomized to intraosseous (i.o.) + intravenous (i.v.) (n = 10), i.o. (n = 8) or i.v. (n = 20) infusions of bone marrow. There were no significant differences in patient characteristics. PMN/l more than 0.5 x 10(9) occurred on days 19 (median), 20 and 18.5 in the i.o. + i.v., i.o. and i.v. groups, respectively. We found a significant reduction in the number of days on total parenteral nutrition (P = 0.03) and a tendency to a reduction in the number of days on antibiotics (P = 0.06) in the i.o. compared to the i.v. group. Bacteraemia did not occur in the i.o. group, but was seen in 30% of the i.v. group (NS). The incidences of acute and chronic graft-versus-host disease, transplantation-related mortality, relapse and patient survival rates were similar in the three groups. Five patients examined with bone marrow scintigraphy showed the same distribution of granulocytes in the bone marrow directly after transplantation and 3 weeks after transplantation, whether the bone marrow was given by the i.o. or by the i.v. route. We conclude that allogeneic bone marrow transplantation can safely be performed by i.o. infusion, but haematopoietic recovery is not improved.