Recombinant human granulocyte colony-stimulating factor after allogeneic bone marrow transplantation.

OBJECTIVE To examine the effect of rhG-CSF on allogeneic bone marrow transplantation. PATIENTS AND METHODS One hundred and twenty patients with acute or chronic leukemia received HLA-A.B.DR identical and MLC negative sibling donor allo-BMT. Among them, 58 cases of were treated with recombinant human granulocyte colony-stimulating factor (rhG-CSF), while the other 62 cases of the 120 patients were treated as control. RESULTS Clinical results showed that the time taken to reach an absolute neutrophil count > 0.5 x 10(9)/L was significantly faster in patients who received rhG-CSF compared with control patients (16.24 +/- 0.25 vs 25.20 +/- 0.16 days. P < 0.001), with significantly less early fever days in patients received rhG-CSF (1.17 +/- 1.10 vs 4.01 +/- 0.37 P < 0.001). We did not observe any increase in acute GVHD and relapse in myeloid leukemia patients. But 7 of 16 patients with ALL relapsed after allo-BMT in rhG-CSF group, while only 3 of 11 patients with ALL relapsed after allo-BMT in control grant (P > 0.05). This phenomenon has not been reported up to now. CONCLUSIONS rhG-CSF can promote engraftment and reduce early fever days after BMT. rhG-CSF has not any effect on a GVHD. The effect of rhG-CSF on leukemia relapse needs to be further studied.