Bone Marrow Transplantation Center Clinical Education Officer Prof. stated that they were happy to perform allogeneic bone marrow transplantation for the first time, which is required for patients with hematological cancer such as leukemia. Dr. Abdulkadir BAŞTÜRK said, “We have completed the requirements of our Bone Marrow Transplantation Center, the infrastructure of which we have been preparing in our hospital for approximately 2 years. We performed our first autologous transplant (transplant from the patient to himself) about 6 months ago. We have performed 8 autologous transplants so far. Today, we successfully performed the first allogeneic transplant (bone marrow transplant from someone else to the patient) for a patient with acute leukemia from his sibling and we are discharging our patient.
Our 36-year-old male patient, to whom we performed allogeneic transplantation for the first time in our center, had high-risk acute myeloid leukemia. When he was diagnosed about 2 years ago, his white blood cells were very high and there was widespread skin involvement. First, we gave various chemotherapy treatments and then we took the disease under control with smart drugs. Then, we performed an allogeneic bone marrow transplant from his fully compatible brother. After approximately 1 month of treatment, we discharge the patient with full recovery. From now on, we will continue to follow our patient closely in the transplant clinic.
Allogeneic transplantation is an important treatment option in acute leukemia or resistant lymphomas. While we did not have a transplant unit, these patients had to go to other cities and stay there for a long time in order to have an allogeneic transplant. Currently, allogeneic transplantation in Konya can only be performed at Konya City Hospital. An important service for our patients. Patients go through very difficult medical processes during these diseases. It is very meaningful for us to facilitate these difficult processes of our patients and contribute to their healing by performing allogeneic transplantation in Konya. "I wish God's recovery to all our patients." said.
Internal Medicine and Hematology specialist Dr. Lecturer Member Seda YILMAZ said, "The process of taking stem cells from the 'bone marrow' or 'peripheral blood (blood in the veins)' of the patient's sibling, relatives or non-relatives and transferring them to the patient is called 'Allogeneic Stem Cell Transplantation'. If a patient is looking for a donor for allogeneic stem cell transplantation, the tissue group of his or her siblings, if any, is first examined. If a fully compatible donor cannot be found among siblings, the patient's close relatives can be screened, and if a positive result is not obtained, 'Bone Marrow Banks' are applied.
In allogeneic stem cell transplantation, as in autologous stem cell transplantation, the patient is first administered high dose chemotherapy. Then, stem cells collected from a healthy donor (sibling, relative or non-relative) are transplanted to the patient. “These stem cells enable the production of healthy blood cells in the patient's bone marrow.” said.