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Conditioning Regimens

Results of autologous transplantation in lymphoma are not improved by increasing the dose of etoposide in the BEAM regimen: a single-centre sequential-cohort study

Bone Marrow Transplantation volume 34, pages 675–682 (2004)Cite this article

Summary:

We have undertaken a retrospective sequential-cohort analysis of 131 lymphoma patients treated with the BEAM regimen and autologous stem cell transplantation, to compare BEAM at standard doses (sBEAM; n=67 from May 1990 to April 1995) and BEAM with escalated etoposide dose from 800 to 1600 mg/m2 (eBEAM; n=64 from May 1995 to June 1999). Transplant-related mortality and incidence of secondary malignancies were similar in both groups. Disease progression was significantly lower in indolent lymphoma (IL) patients receiving eBEAM (7 vs 43%), although survival was comparable due to a higher toxic mortality in the eBEAM group. The 5-year event-free survival and overall survival were better in Hodgkin's disease (HD) patients treated with eBEAM (70 and 77%, respectively) compared to sBEAM (58 and 69%, respectively), but the difference was not statistically significant. In aggressive lymphomas, no difference was detected between groups. Our results indicate that while escalation of the etoposide doses in the BEAM conditioning regimen does not appear to improve outcome, encouraging results in IL and HD may warrant further studies.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Mark Anderson for the excellent technical assistance.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Servicio de Hematología, Hospital Clínico Universitario de Salamanca, Paseo de San Vicente 58-182, Salamanca, Spain

    A Martín, M D Caballero, J A Pérez-Simón, N López-Holgado, M V Mateos, M C Cañizo & J F San Miguel

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  1. A Martín
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Correspondence to J A Pérez-Simón.

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Martín, A., Caballero, M., Pérez-Simón, J. et al. Results of autologous transplantation in lymphoma are not improved by increasing the dose of etoposide in the BEAM regimen: a single-centre sequential-cohort study. Bone Marrow Transplant 34, 675–682 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.bmt.1704595

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