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Frequency of lethal central nervous system neurotoxicity in patients undergoing allogeneic stem cell transplantation: a retrospective registry analysis

Bone Marrow Transplantation volume 55, pages 1642–1646 (2020)Cite this article

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Chemotherapy-related neurotoxicity is a significant cause of reduced performance status, reduced quality of life, and increased transplant-related mortality [1,2,3]. A single center report on central nervous system (CNS) complications in allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) in general identified age, acute graft-versus-host disease (aGvHD) grade III–IV, transfusion-dependent thrombocytopenia, and delayed platelet engraftment as risk factors [4]. Multiple case reports are showing single center events of conditioning-related lethal CNS toxicities. Among those, fludarabine and total body irradiation (TBI) have been frequently reported on being associated with CNS [5,6,7]. However, no systematic multicenter registry-based report exists on CNS toxicity after allogeneic HSCT. In this retrospective multicenter study we use the EBMT registry to investigate the frequency and associated characteristics of lethal CNS toxicity after allogeneic HSCT.

Using χ2 statistics for categorical variables (or Fisher’s exact test if needed) and the Mann–Whitney test for continuous variables, we compared the characteristics of the CNS toxicity cohort to the death by any other cause group. All analyses were done with R 3.4.2 [8].

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Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: Christian Koenecke, Grzegorz W. Basak

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Hematology, Hemostasis, Oncology and Stem Cell Transplantation, Hanover Medical School, Hannover, Germany

    Christian R. Schultze-Florey & Christian Koenecke

  2. EBMT Data Office, Paris, France

    Christophe Peczynski, Ivan de Marino & Emmanuelle Polge

  3. Department of Hematology-BMT, Hopital St. Louis, Paris, France

    Gerard Socié

  4. Programme de Transplantation & Therapie Cellulaire, Centre de Recherche en Cancérologie de Marseille, Marseille, France

    Didier Blaise

  5. Department of Bone Marrow Transplantation, University Hospital Essen, Essen, Germany

    Dietrich Beelen

  6. Medical Clinic and Policlinic 1, Hematology and Cellular Therapy, University Hospital Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany

    Georg-Nicolaus Franke

  7. Bone Marrow Transplantation Centre, University Hospital Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany

    Nicolaus Kröger

  8. Department of Hematology/Oncology, University of Muenster, Muenster, Germany

    Matthias Stelljes

  9. Raisa Gorbacheva Memorial Research Institute for Paediatric Oncology, Hematology, and Transplantation, First State Pavlov Medical University of St. Petersburg, St. Petersburg, Russia

    Boris Afanasyev

  10. Department of Haematological Medicine, DGKT School of Medicine, London, UK

    Victoria Potter

  11. Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, Hans Messner Allogeneic Transplantation Program, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada

    Armin Gerbitz

  12. Universitaetsklinikum Dresden, Medizinische Klinik und Poliklinik I, Dresden, Germany

    Johannes Schetelig

  13. Bone Marrow Transplant Unit, University Hospital Centre Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia

    Zinaida Peric

  14. Department of Hematology, University Hospital Leuven and KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

    Hélène Schoemans

  15. Department of Hematology, Oncology and Internal Medicine, Medical University of Warsaw, Warsaw, Poland

    Grzegorz W. Basak

Authors
  1. Christian R. Schultze-Florey
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  2. Christophe Peczynski
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  3. Ivan de Marino
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  4. Emmanuelle Polge
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  7. Dietrich Beelen
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  8. Georg-Nicolaus Franke
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  9. Nicolaus Kröger
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  12. Victoria Potter
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  13. Armin Gerbitz
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  14. Johannes Schetelig
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  15. Zinaida Peric
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  16. Hélène Schoemans
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  17. Christian Koenecke
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  18. Grzegorz W. Basak
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on behalf of the EBMT Transplant Complications Working Party (TCWP)

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Correspondence to Christian R. Schultze-Florey.

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Schultze-Florey, C.R., Peczynski, C., de Marino, I. et al. Frequency of lethal central nervous system neurotoxicity in patients undergoing allogeneic stem cell transplantation: a retrospective registry analysis. Bone Marrow Transplant 55, 1642–1646 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41409-019-0738-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41409-019-0738-3

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