support of unrelated stem cell donor searches by donor center-initiated hla typing of potentially matching donors支持不相关的干细胞捐赠者捐赠center-initiated hla输入搜索的潜在匹配的捐献者.pdfVIP

Support of Unrelated Stem Cell Donor Searches by Donor Center-Initiated HLA Typing of Potentially Matching Donors 1 1 1 1 1 1 Alexander H. Schmidt *, Ute V. Solloch , Daniel Baier , Alois Grathwohl , Jan Hofmann , Julia Pingel , Andrea Stahr1, Gerhard Ehninger2 ¨ 1 DKMS German Bone Marrow Donor Center, Tubingen, Germany, 2 Internal Medicine I, University Hospital Carl Gustav Carus, Dresden, Germany Abstract Large registries of potential unrelated stem cell donors have been established in order to enable stem cell transplantation for patients without HLA-identical related donors. Donor search is complicated by the fact that the stored HLA information of many registered donors is incomplete. We carried out a project that was aimed to improve chances of patients with ongoing donor searches to find an HLA-matched unrelated donor. For that purpose, we carried out additional donor center- initiated HLA-DRB1 typing of donors who were only typed for the HLA loci A and B so far and were potential matches for patients in need of a stem cell transplant. In total, 8,861 donors were contacted for donor center-initiated HLA-DRB1 typing within 1,089 donor searches. 12 of these donors have donated stem cells so far, 8 thereof for their respective target patients. We conclude that chances of patients with ongoing donor searches to find an HLA-matched unrelated donor can indeed be improved by donor-center initiated typing that is carried out in addition to the standard donor search process. Our results also raise questions regarding the appropriate use of incompletely typed donors within unrelated donor searches. Citation: Schmidt AH, Solloch UV, Baier D, Grathwohl A, Hofmann J, et al. (2011) Support of Unrelat