Disease burden may identify patients more likely to benefit from second allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation to treat relapsed acute myelogenous leukemia.

Overview

The major cause of failure after allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) for acute myelogenous leukemia (AML) is disease relapse or progression. We analyzed the outcome of second HSCT for treatment of patients with relapsed, refractory AML/myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) at our institution. A total of 72 patients were eligible for this analysis. In all, 25 (35%) patients received salvage chemotherapy prior to the second transplant procedure and only two (3%) patients were in complete remission at the time of the second transplant. A total of 20 patients (28%) had low leukemia burden as measured by the absence of peripheral blood blasts and