[A 42 year old patient with bilateral loss of sight and hypertension. Gemcitabine-associated thrombotic microangiopathy (TMA)].

We report a case of a 42 year old male patient with a history of adrenocortical carcinoma, who was admitted with bilateral loss of sight and hypertension. Laboratory tests and further clinical evaluation showed hemolytic anemia, thrombocytopenia and acute renal failure. This was consistent with thrombotic microangiopathy / hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS) due to gemcitabine therapy.

Evaluation of the COM.TEC cell separator in predicting the yield of harvested CD34+ cells.

Background: This multicenter study was performed with the intention to evaluate the exactness of the predicted CD34+ cell yield calculated by two leukapheresis programs of the cell separator COM.TEC upon the number of donor's circulating CD34+ cells and the blood volume processed.

Study Design And Methods: Patients and healthy donors (n = 166) received mobilization by chemotherapy and/or granulocyte colony-stimulating factor and underwent CD34+ cell harvest by the leukapheresis programs MNC or RV-PBSC (n = 203).

Multicenter phase II trial of chemoradiation with oxaliplatin for rectal cancer.

Purpose: To evaluate the activity and safety of preoperative radiotherapy (RT) and concurrent capecitabine and oxaliplatin (XELOX-RT) plus four cycles of adjuvant XELOX in patients with rectal cancer.

Patients And Methods: One hundred ten patients with T3/T4 or N+ rectal cancer were entered onto the trial in 11 investigator sites and received preoperative RT (50.4 Gy in 28 fractions).

Local irradiation prior to stem cell harvest has no influence on CD34+ yield: a quantitative analysis.

In patients with multiple myeloma, irradiation of bone marrow prior to mobilization of autologous peripheral blood progenitor cells (PBPCs) may lead to a reduced yield of CD34+ cells. Quantitative effects have not been sufficiently assessed. We retrospectively performed a multivariate analysis in 114 patients (67 men, 47 women) with multiple myeloma, of whom 53 (47%) patients had been irradiated prior to mobilization chemotherapy.