Successful treatment of pure red cell aplasia with a single dose of rituximab in a child after major ABO incompatible peripheral blood allogeneic stem cell transplantation for acquired aplastic anemia.

Pure red cell aplasia (PRCA) is a well-known although infrequent hematologic complication after allogeneic bone marrow transplantation. PRCA occurs in cases of major ABO-mismatch between donor and recipient and is believed to be due to inhibition of donor erythroid progenitors by residual host isohemagglutinins. We report a 10-year-old boy with post-hepatitis aplastic anemia (AA) who developed PRCA after HLA-matched familial peripheral blood stem cell transplantation (SCT) following conditioning with Cph 200 mg/kg + ATG 90 mg/kg.

A successful cord blood transplant in a child with second accelerated phase chronic myeloid leukemia following lymphoid blast crisis.

We describe a 5-year-old girl with Ph(+) CML who received a cord blood transplant in a second accelerated phase after a very early lymphoid blast crisis. She was induced into CR by ALL-directed chemotherapy and then maintained with IFN-alpha2b together with weekly rotational chemotherapy. Nineteen months after diagnosis, her mother gave birth to an HLA-compatible sibling, whose cord blood was cryopreserved.

Toxicity, supportive care and costs of two chemotherapy protocols for treatment of childhood ALL in Russia: BFM 90m and MB 91.

Since the late 1980s, polychemotherapy protocols for the treatment of childhood acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL) derived from Western European and American regimens have been introduced in Russian paediatric oncology centres. Whereas treatment results were significantly improved compared with the results of former non-standard treatment strategies, the substantial toxicity of these protocols required a high standard of supportive care, and the high costs of treatment became a major problem. In 1991, a new protocol was developed with the aim of reducing toxicity and costs without affecting efficacy of the treatment.