Manipal Hospital has organized an interactive session with its 60 bone marrow transplant (BMT) survivors to increase awareness about the potentially curative option for diseases like blood cancers (leukaemia, lymphomas) as well as for thalassemia and bone marrow failure syndrome like aplastic anaemia.

Currently, India has 15-20 centres offering matched sibling bone marrow transplants and Manipal Hospital is one of them having a tie-up with University of Minnesota Physicians (UMP) for the same. Donor Registries: International bone marrow transplant registry (IBMTR) and European Group for Bone Marrow Transplant( EBMT) are for  unrelated donor and cord blood for those who do not have matched sibling donor available.

BMT is not an experimental therapy but is an established scientific procedure.  Technique of BMT involves giving high dose chemotherapy to destroy old marrow and then infusing stem cells collected from donor or self for repopulating the bone marrow to produced blood cells. Donor for BMT needs to be matched by doing some blood tests for HLA antigens. Sibling donors are best. Unrelated donor and cord blood are other sources of stem cells. New stem cells can have reaction with the body called Graft versus Host Disease (GVHD) which requires treatment, according to the hospital.
 
“We could achieve this through advances in the treatment of cancer and improvements in supportive care which have improved the results and tolerability of BMT. This procedure has become safer and clinically applicable in a large number of diseases. Sibling donor is considered to be the best, however there is only 30 per cent chance of having a matched sibling in a family.  Therefore, now with the presence of international cell donor registries, it is easier to source matched unrelated donors as well. Unrelated transplants and mismatched transplant are being done all over the world with increasing success,” stated Dr Ashish Dixit, Consultant, Medical Oncology & Haematology, Manipal Health Enterprises.
 
“The chance of finding a match through international registries is approximately 50 per cent only. Cord blood transplant, which yet other source donors, offers hope here since complete match may not be required. Cord blood banks have been established to have ready availability of cord stem cells for BMT purpose. However cord blood is used as source of stem cells only if matched sibling is not available as cord blood transplants are more complicated and risky”, stated Dr. Amit Rauthan, Consultant, Medical Oncology, Manipal Health Enterprises.