AUTOLOGOUS BONE-MARROW TRANSPLANTATION IN NON-HODGKINS-LYMPHOMAS - PREDICTION OF MONONUCLEAR CELL YIELD IN BONE-MARROW HARVESTS

We retrospectively analyzed the actors influencing the mononuclear cel l (MNC) yield of bone marrow (BM) harvests in a cohort of 15 non-Hodgk in's lymphoma patients undergoing autologous bone marrow transplantati on. All the patients were treated with the F-MACHOP regimen and four o f them also received radiotherapy on bulky disease. Before harvesting, the patients underwent complete peripheral blood (PB) count, BM biops y and aspirate. WBC and MNC/mu L were determined on the pre-harvest PB and BM aspirate samples using an automated counter. The following var iables were examined in univariate and multivariate regression analysi s for possible influence on the MNC yield in the harvests: age, sex, n umber of cycles of CT, previous radiotherapy, state of the disease at the time of harvest, interval between the end of therapy and BM harves t, cellularity of the BM biopsy, absolute WBC and MNC counts in the PB before harvesting, absolute WBC and MNC counts in the BM aspirate per formed before harvesting. The amount of marrow harvested was constant for all patients: 21.2 +/- 0.24 mL/kg B.W. Among the factors analyzed, two correlated strongly with the MNC yield/kg E.W. in the harvests: t he MNC count in pre-harvest PB (r = 0.823; p = 0.0001) and the MNC cou nt in pre-harvest BM aspirate (r = 0.802; p = 0.0003). A regression eq uation was generated that allows calculation of the MNC/kg yield prior to harvesting.