Mayo Clinic hosted a webinar on bone marrow failure and bone marrow transplantation on Wednesday, Jan. 20, 2016. Shakila Khan, M.D., Chair of Pediatric Hematology-Oncology and Director of the Pediatric Bone Marrow Transplant Program, Vilmarie Rodriguez, M.D., Associate Director of the Pediatric Bone Marrow Transplant Program, and Mrinal Patnaik, M.B.B.S., Assistant Professor of Medicine and Oncology, discussed bone marrow failure symptoms, diagnosis, and treatment options, including bone marrow transplantation. A live question and answer session followed the presentation.
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Hi @amywilcox, here is a response from our physicians: Infusing more of your daughter’s cells would be done through donor lymphocyte infusion, or DLI, which is performed if there is concern for graft rejection or early relapse. Without knowing the exact details of your son’s case it is difficult to say, but if he has donor cells DLI could be considered.
Hello, here is a response from our physicians: We are still learning about telomeres. They are important in cancer, aging, response to drugs, etc. Shortened telomeres are on the chromosomes, so they are technically in the whole body. Patients with aplastic anemia don’t respond well to immunosuppression and are more sensitive to transplant conditioning, but do fine with reduced-intensity conditioning.
Autologous stem cell transplants can produce long term remissions in follicular lymphoma, better if done earlier in the course of their disease. This type of transplant is not curative for most patients. Allogeneic stem cell transplants can be curative for some patients but are more risky and in general are recommended for younger patients.
@colleenyoung
Hi @amywilcox. Such hard news to hear. Thank goodness there are options to explore. You may wish to connect with @Jackiewizardof here https://connect.mayoclinic.org/discussion/hello-well-i-am-52-and-found-out-yesterday-that-i-have-something/ She is a young brain tumor survivor.