A recent article in the journal Blood reported on the long-term outcome of multiple myeloma patients each treated with two stem cell transplants.

In this study, 102 patients with multiple myeloma began treatment with high-dose melphalan (Alkeran) as a conditioning regimen. Patients then received an autologous stem cell transplant, using stem cells collected from the patient before chemotherapy. This was followed by radiation therapy.

Finally, patients received high-dose chemotherapy in combination with an allogeneic stem cell transplant, in which stem cells collected from another individual were placed into the patient’s body …

Long-term follow-up results of two stem cell transplantation trials were presented at the 2008 American Society of Hematology (ASH) meeting. The trials were conducted from April 2000 to April 2004 in high risk de novo multiple myeloma patients. De novo multiple myeloma refers to the first occurrence of cancer in the body.

The two trials compared autologous transplantation followed by non-myeloablative allotransplantation (trial IFM99-03) with tandem (double) autologous transplantation (trial IFM99-04).  In the autologous transplantation procedure, a patient's stem cells are collected and stored prior to chemotherapy and later returned to the …