Incidence and risk factors for secondary graft failure in uniformly treated patients with severe aplastic anemia receiving fludarabine and cyclophosphamide for conditioning and matched sibling bone marrow graft as stem cell source.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND AIMS: Graft failure after allogeneic transplant for aplastic anemia is problematic. The risk of graft failure depends on multiple variables, including the preparative regimen, donor type, stem cell dose and source among other variables. METHODS: We performed a retrospective analysis of patients with aplastic anemia who underwent matched-sibling allogeneic transplant at a single center. RESULTS: We identified 82 patients who fit the inclusion criteria. One had primary graft failure and was excluded from this analysis. The recipient median age was 22 years. The donor median age was 23 years. The median time from diagnosis to transplant was 1.6 months. The median number of red cell transfusions before transplant was nine. The median number of platelet transfusions before transplant was 18. Thirteen patients developed secondary graft failure, with a cumulative incidence at 5 years of 16% and median time to develop secondary graft failure of 129 days. All patients engrafted with a median time for neutrophil engraftment of 19 days and a median time for platelet engraftment of 22 days. The survival of patients with or without secondary graft failure was not different. Major or bidirectional ABO incompatibility and older recipient age were statistically significantly associated with greater risk of secondary graft failure. CONCLUSIONS: Secondary graft failure is a significant complication after allogeneic transplant for SAA. Identification of recipients at risk and mitigating the potential risks of this complication is warranted.