Rapid hematopoietic recovery from an ex vivo expanded umbilical cord blood (UCB) transplant approach was linked with early clinical benefit in a study involving 104 individuals.

Participants included patients who received UCB stem cells cultured ex vivo for 3 weeks with nicotinamide (NiCord, n=18) and standard UCB recipients (n=86). Investigators compared infection episodes and hospitalization during the first 100 days. Among the results:

• Median time to neutrophil engraftment was ~13 days in NiCord patients, vs 26 days in standard recipients.
• After adjusting for certain variables, NiCord recipients had a significantly lower risk for total infection, including moderate to severe infection and bacterial infection.
• NiCord recipients spent ~70 of the first 100 days out of the hospital, vs ~50 days for those in receiving standard treatment.