Feasibility of finding an unrelated bone marrow donor on international registries for New Zealand patients

Allogeneic bone marrow transplantation is the treatment of choice for sever al hematological conditions. Unfortunately, for the majority (70%) of patie nts an HLA-matched sibling donor is not available and is matched unrelated donor must be found if they are to proceed to allogeneic transplantation. M ost of the donors on international registries are of Caucasian ethnic origi n, It has been recognized that patients from certain racial groups have a r educed chance of finding an unrelated donor. This study reports the feasibi lity of finding an unrelated donor for our local New Zealand patients of Ca ucasian, New Zealand Maori and Pacific Islander ethnic origin presenting wi th transplantable hematological conditions at a single center. The search w as performed on international registries using HLA-A,B and DR typings for o ur patients. Six of six and five of six matches were evaluated. We have sho wn that Maori and Pacific Islanders have significantly lower hit rates than Caucasians when searched for 6/6 antigen matches, but there was no signifi cant difference between the three ethnic groups in finding a 5/6 antigen ma tched donor, This study supports the policy of the New Zealand Bone Marrow Donor Registry in recruiting New Zealand Maori and Pacific Islanders.