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Pediatric Transplants

Incidence of bacteremias and invasive mycoses in children undergoing allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation: a single center experience

Bone Marrow Transplantation volume 41, pages 339–347 (2008)Cite this article

Abstract

We performed a retrospective single center study to define the epidemiology of bacteremias or invasive mycoses in pediatric allogeneic hematopoietic SCT (HSCT) from matched related donors (MRD) or alternative donors (AD). During 119 213 days of follow-up, 156 infections were observed: 130 bacteremias (27 in MRD-HSCT and 103 in AD-HSCT recipients) and 26 invasive mycoses (8 in MRD-HSCT and 18 in AD-HSCT recipients). Overall, the risk of bacteremia was fivefold that of invasive mycosis (P<0.001). AD-HSCT recipients had a higher percentage of infections (89 vs 27%; P<0.001), a higher rate/100 days of immunosuppression (infection rate (IR): 0.21 vs 0.06; P<0.001) and a higher proportion of repeated infections (44 vs 9%; P=0.001). In AD-HSCT, the relative risk of bacteremia was 2.87 in the pre-engraftment period, 5.84 in the early post-engraftment period and 6.46 in the late post-engraftment period (P<0.001) compared to MRD-HSCT. Only after 1 year did the epidemiology become similar. The epidemiology of invasive mycoses did not differ significantly between the two types of transplant.

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Acknowledgements

The study was partially supported by grants from Fondazione CARIGE, Compagnia di S Paolo, Italian foundation for Research on Neuroblastoma and by Gaslini Children Hospital.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Hematology and Oncology, Infectious Diseases Unit, G Gaslini Children Hospital, Genoa, Italy

    E Castagnola, I Caviglia, C Moroni & A Timitilli

  2. Epidemiology and Biostatistics Section, Scientific Directorate, G Gaslini Children Hospital, Genoa, Italy

    F Bagnasco, S Caruso & R Haupt

  3. Department of Hematology and Oncology, Bone Marrow Transplant Unit, G Gaslini Children Hospital, Genoa, Italy

    M Faraci, B Cappelli, G Morreale & E Lanino

  4. Department of Hematology and Oncology, Immunohematology and Transfusion Medicine Service, G Gaslini Children Hospital, Genoa, Italy

    G Tripodi

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  1. E Castagnola
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Correspondence to E Castagnola.

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Castagnola, E., Bagnasco, F., Faraci, M. et al. Incidence of bacteremias and invasive mycoses in children undergoing allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation: a single center experience. Bone Marrow Transplant 41, 339–347 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.bmt.1705921

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