Kinetics of plasma-cell chimerism after allogeneic stem cell transplantation by highly sensitive real-time PCR based on sequence polymorphism and its value to quantify minimal residual disease in patients with multiple myeloma.

Objective: To investigate lineage-specific chimerism of plasma cells after allogeneic transplantation by real-time PCR based on bi-allelic sequence polymorphism or, in case of female-to-male transplantation, on the detection of the DFFRY gene and to determine its value to quantify minimal residual disease in myeloma patients.

Methods: Forty-eight samples from bone marrow samples and peripheral blood from 34 nonmyeloma patients were analyzed at different times after transplantation. Sixty-two samples from 22 myeloma patients were analyzed at different times after allogeneic stem cell transplantation, and results were compared with immunofixation and, in some cases, with PCR data using patient-specific primers.