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Blood, 15 September 2006, Vol. 108, No. 6, pp. 2127-2130. Prepublished online as a Blood First Edition Paper on May 25, 2006; DOI 10.1182/blood-2006-04-007898. This Article Full Text (PDF) Supplemental Figures All Versions of this Article: blood-2006-04-007898v1 108/6/2127    most recent Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in PubMed Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Rights and Permissions Citing Articles Citing Articles via HighWire Citing Articles via CrossRef Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Zenz, T. Articles by Stilgenbauer, S. Search for Related Content PubMed PubMed Citation Articles by Zenz, T. Articles by Stilgenbauer, S. Social Bookmarking                   What's this?  Previous Article  |  Next Article  Submitted April 4, 2006 Accepted May 9, 2006 Autologous graft versus host disease-like syndrome after an alemtuzumab containing conditioning regimen and autologous stem cell transplantation for chronic lymphocytic leukemia Thorsten Zenz, Matthias Ritgen, Peter Dreger, Alexander Krober, Thomas F Barth, Richard Schlenk, Sebastian Bottcher, Michael J Hallek, Michael Kneba, Donald Bunjes, Hartmut Dohner, and Stephan Stilgenbauer* Department of Internal Medicine III, University of Ulm Department of Internal Medicine II, University of Kiel Department of Internal Medicine V, University of Heidelberg Department of Pathology, University of Ulm Department of Internal Medicine I, University of Cologne * Corresponding author; email: stephan.stilgenbauer{at}uniklinik-ulm.de. A high incidence of autologous graft-versus-host-disease (auto-GvHD) was observed after an alemtuzumab containing conditioning regimen and autologous stem cell transplantation (auto-SCT) for CLL. Almost all surviving patients developed a skin rash (87%). In 7 patients (58%) a diagnosis of auto-GvHD was made (vs. 0% after TBI/Cy p=0.01). All patients with auto-GvHD needed immunosuppression and 3/7 were hospitalized because of GvHD. The median duration of GvHD was 517 days (range 60-867). Auto-GvHD was associated with an abnormally high CD4/CD8 ratio due to a severe depletion of CD8+ T-cells pointing to a potential pathomechanism. A high non-relapse-mortality led to the discontinuation of the trial. The current results do not support the use of high dose alemtuzumab combined with TBI and auto-SCT. However, the addition of alemtuzumab led to improved disease control at the molecular level and longer follow-up will show if the GvHD-like syndrome may contribute to prolonged MRD negativity. CiteULike    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    What's this? This article has been cited by other articles: J. G. Gribben The Role of Stem Cell Transplantation in Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia ASCO Educational Book, January 1, 2008; 2008(1): 291 - 296. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

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