Outcome of hematopoietic cell transplantation for DNA double-strand break repair disorders.

BACKGROUND: Rare DNA breakage repair disorders predispose to infection and lymphoreticular malignancies. Hematopoietic cell transplantation (HCT) is curative, but coadministered chemotherapy or radiotherapy is damaging because of systemic radiosensitivity. We collected HCT outcome data for Nijmegen breakage syndrome, DNA ligase IV deficiency, Cernunnos-XRCC4-like factor (Cernunnos-XLF) deficiency, and ataxia-telangiectasia (AT). METHODS: Data from 38 centers worldwide, including indication, donor, conditioning regimen, graft-versus-host disease, and outcome, were analyzed. Conditioning was classified as myeloablative conditioning (MAC) if it contained radiotherapy or alkylators and reduced-intensity conditioning (RIC) if no alkylators and/or 150 mg/m2 fludarabine or less and 40 mg/kg cyclophosphamide or less were used. RESULTS: Fifty-five new, 14 updated, and 18 previously published patients were analyzed. Median age at HCT was 48 months (range, 1.5-552 months). Twenty-nine patients underwent transplantation for infection, 21 had malignancy, 13 had bone marrow failure, 13 received pre-emptive transplantation, 5 had multiple indications, and 6 had no information. Twenty-two received MAC, 59 received RIC, and 4 were infused; information was unavailable for 2 patients. Seventy-three of 77 patients with DNA ligase IV deficiency, Cernunnos-XLF deficiency, or Nijmegen breakage syndrome received conditioning. Survival was 53 (69%) of 77 and was worse for those receiving MAC than for those receiving RIC (P = .006). Most deaths occurred early after transplantation, suggesting poor tolerance of conditioning. Survival in patients with AT was 25%. Forty-one (49%) of 83 patients experienced acute GvHD, which was less frequent in those receiving RIC compared with those receiving MAC (26/56 [46%] vs 12/21 [57%], P = .45). Median follow-up was 35 months (range, 2-168 months). No secondary malignancies were reported during 15 years of follow-up. Growth and developmental delay remained after HCT; immune-mediated complications resolved. CONCLUSION: RIC HCT resolves DNA repair disorder-associated immunodeficiency. Long-term follow-up is required for secondary malignancy surveillance. Routine HCT for AT is not recommended.

Mismatch repair deficiency as a prognostic factor in mucinous colorectal cancer.

There is some uncertainty about pathological grading of mucinous colorectal adenocarcinoma, defined as colorectal cancer demonstrating at least 50% mucinous differentiation. Under the WHO 2000 classification mucinous colorectal cancer was considered high grade. However under the current WHO 2010 classification microsatellite unstable/mismatch repair-deficient (MSI/MMRd) mucinous colorectal cancer is considered low grade, whereas microsatellite stable/mismatch repair proficient (MSS/MMRp) tumours are high grade. However there is little empirical evidence for this approach. We therefore compared the long term survival of patients with MSI/MMRd vs MSS/MMRp mucinous colorectal cancer in a large unselected cohort of patients undergoing surgery at our institution from 1998 to 2011. There were 2608 patients in the cohort, of which 264 (10.1%) were mucinous. 95 (36%) of the mucinous tumours were microsatellite unstable. The all-cause 5-year survival of mucinous MSI/MMRd colorectal cancer was similar to that of non-mucinous low-grade colorectal cancer (73 vs 67%, P=0.368), and significantly better than that of both non-mucinous high-grade (73 vs 53%, P<0.001) and mucinous MSS/MMRp colorectal cancer (73 vs 57%, P=0.023). The 5-year survival of mucinous MSS/MMRp colorectal cancer was slightly better than that of non-mucinous high-grade patients (57 vs 53%, P=0.027), but significantly worse than that of non-mucinous low-grade colorectal cancer (57 vs 67%, P=0.018). In multivariate Cox regression analysis, conventional histological grade based on glandular differentiation maintained prognostic significance (P=0.003) whereas MSI/MMRd status just failed to be statistically significant (P=0.062). Our findings support the WHO 2010 approach that as a group mucinous MSS/MMRp colorectal cancers are biologically aggressive. However, grading based exclusively on MSI/MMR status may be overly simplistic as conventional grading based on the degree of glandular differentiation still holds greater prognostic significance in multivariate analysis.