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CLINICAL OBSERVATIONS, INTERVENTIONS, AND THERAPEUTIC TRIALS
From Service de Biochimie et Biologie
Moléculaire, Centre Hépato-biliaire, Anatomie Pathologique,
UPRES 1596 Virus Hépatotropes et Cancer, INSERM U492
Epidémiologie et Biostatistiques, Hôpital Paul Brousse,
Faculté de Médecine Paris-Sud et Assistance Publique de
Paris, Villejuif, France.
Monitoring of posttransplantation lymphoproliferative disorder
(LPD) is usually based on imaging, which lacks sensitivity. A
prospective study in 911 consecutive recipients of liver transplants was conducted to assess the value of gammopathy monitoring by serum
protein electrophoresis (SPE) and to compare it with conventional follow-up methods. Patients systematically underwent SPE testing just
before transplantation, at least twice during the first year after
transplantation, and once a year thereafter. Patients with LPD
underwent SPE testing every month. Immunofixation was done if
abnormalities were detected by SPE. Gammopathy was observed in 114 patients, 18 of whom had onset of LPD. In 3 other patients, LPD
developed, but no gammopathy was detected before onset of LPD or while
LPD was present. Multivariate analyses showed gammopathy (relative risk
[RR], 65.3), more than one transplantation (RR, 7.5), and viral
cirrhosis (RR, 2.8) to be independent prognostic factors associated
with occurrence of LPD. LPD was treated by reducing immunosuppression,
with or without chemotherapy, administration of anti-CD20 monoclonal
antibody, or surgery. The mortality rate was 24% (5 of 21 patients).
Remission, which occurred in 13 patients, was associated with
disappearance of gammopathy in 10 patients. In 5 patients,
normalization of SPE results preceded the diagnosis of remission based
on imaging, by a mean of 4 months. For diagnosis of LPD remission, the
positive and negative predictive values of disappearance of gammopathy
were 91% and 100%, respectively; and gammopathy monitoring was more
sensitive than imaging (100% and 38%, respectively). Gammopathy
monitoring is an inexpensive, noninvasive, sensitive way to detect LPD
and assess the efficacy of treatment. It could be used routinely in
follow-up of recipients of transplants. This article has been cited by other articles:
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| Copyright © 2001 by American Society of Hematology Online ISSN: 1528-0020 | |||||||||