What is a BMT

Blood and Marrow Transplants (BMTs) are performed to treat people suffering from a wide variety of diseases.

High doses of chemotherapy, that are toxic to the normal bone marrow, can be given to patients with leukaemias, lymphomas and other blood disorders if they are “rescued” with a source of cells that will repopulate the bone marrow – the so called Haematopoietic Progenitor Cells (HPCs). These cells may be obtained from the patient themselves (autologous transplantation), or the HPCs may be collected from another person (allogeneic transplantation), either from the bone marrow, peripheral blood or umbilical cord blood.

As the source of these cells is increasingly from tissue other than bone marrow, the term Bone Marrow Transplantation is being substituted by the more correct terminology of Blood and Marrow Transplantation.

To see if you can donate your cells contact the Australian Bone Marrow Donor Registry at www.abmdr.org.au

When cells come from another person (allogeneic transplant) the donor may be a matched brother or sister (matched sibling donor). In the absence of such a donor, an unrelated donor may be used.

Apart from the treatment of malignancy, the ability to use cells from another person also allows the treatment of a wide range of other diseases. These include a broad array of genetic and storage disorders and account for about one third of all paediatric BMT procedures performed in Australia and New Zealand, and a relatively high proportion of unrelated allogeneic procedures. Continuing research is likely to broaden the indications for the use of BMT.

Patients requiring a BMT are placed under the care of a dedicated multidisciplinary team. The team’s role includes care for the patient from diagnosis, identification of need for BMT, identification of source of stem cells, the BMT procedure itself, short term and long term follow up, transition from paediatric to adult care for paediatric recipients, and through successful reintegration into an active life. In some cases, palliative care and psychosocial support to patients and/or carers and families also form part of the overall services required.