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How Recipient Age, Stem Cell Source Impacts Survival
Biol Blood Marrow Transplant; ePub 2016 Sep 15; Gadalla, et al
The link between donor relative telomere length (RTL) and post-HCT outcomes in recipients with severe aplastic anemia (SAA) seems to vary depending on recipient age and stem cell source, according to a study involving more than 700 individuals.
Seeking to validate prior findings, investigators used monoplex qPCR to measure RTL in a new SAA validation cohort (n=428). They also looked at data from those in the original study cohort (n=278).
From the validation cohort:
• In patients <40 years, the survival hazard ratios comparing longest with shortest and middle RTL tertiles was 0.75, vs 1.05 for those ≥40 years.
• In bone marrow recipients, the survival hazard ratio was 0.68, vs 1.29 for peripheral blood stem cell grafts.
In the combined cohorts, statistically significant survival improvement occurred only in those <40 years of age who received bone marrow grafts.
Gadalla S, Wang T, Dagnall C, et al. Effect of recipient age and stem cell source on the association between donor telomere length and survival after allogeneic unrelated hematopoietic cell transplantation for severe aplastic anemia. [Published online ahead of print September 15, 2016]. Biol Blood Marrow Transplant. doi:10.1016/j.bbmt.2016.09.012.