Background: Reduced-intensity conditioning (RIC) regimens can mitigate the toxicity of hematopoietic cell transplantation (HCT) in children with non-malignant diseases, but are associated with increased risk for post-transplant mixed donor/recipient chimerism (MC) and/or graft loss (GL). Intervention with donor lymphocytes or stem cell boosts (DLI/boost) may be necessary, but there is limited information about timing and results of intervention.
Procedure: We retrospectively evaluated 31 consecutive pediatric recipients of an alemtuzumab-based RIC HCT at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia from May 2007 to December 2012 to determine the incidence of MC, GL, and use of DLI/boost. All patients received alemtuzumab with either fludarabine (150 mg/m(2) )/melphalan (140 mg/m(2) ) (n = 30) or fludarabine/busulfan (n = 1), and unmanipulated marrow grafts from related (48%) or matched unrelated (52%) donors.
Results: Of surviving patients, 67% and 44% displayed MC and MC with ≤80% donor contribution (MC ≤ 80%), respectively. Rates of MC, MC ≤ 80%, DLI/boost, and GL were significantly higher in recipients of proximal/intermediate (100%, 73%, 46%, and 46%, respectively) compared to distal alemtuzumab (44%, 25%, 6%, and 6%, respectively). Event-free and overall survival was significantly lower in HLH compared with non-HLH patients. Twenty percent of patients required DLI/boost, and DLI/boost did not affect the incidence of GL.
Conclusions: RIC with proximal/intermediate alemtuzumab is associated with high rates of MC, need for DLI/boost, and GL.
Keywords: CAMPATH; alemtuzumab; bone marrow transplant; non-malignant disease; reduced-intensity conditioning.
© 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.