Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2023 Jul;51(7):3000605231187932.
doi: 10.1177/03000605231187932.

High levels of NK Cells in graft are associated with reduced febrile neutropenia after haploidentical peripheral blood stem cell transplantation

Caili Guo  1 , Xinyan Li  1 , Miaojing Li  1 , Pengcheng He  1 , Wenjuan Wang  1 , Xiaoning Wang  1   2
Affiliations

High levels of NK Cells in graft are associated with reduced febrile neutropenia after haploidentical peripheral blood stem cell transplantation

Caili Guo et al. J Int Med Res. 2023 Jul.

Abstract

Objective: To investigate the impact of natural killer (NK) cells in the graft on the outcome following haploidentical peripheral blood stem cell transplantation (haplo-PBSCT).

Methods: We retrospectively collected data from patients who had undergone haplo-PBSCT at our centre from January 2019 to November 2021. The percentage of NK cells in stem cell grafts was detected by flow cytometry. Based on the median (range) count of NK cells (1.8 [0.4-6.0] × 108/kg), patients were separated into high and low NK cell count groups.

Results: Data from 96 patients were analysed. Patients were evenly distributed (48 in each group) into high and low NK cell count groups. There was no significant difference in neutrophil and platelet recovery between the two groups. However, the rates of febrile neutropenia, bacterial infection, and invasive fungal disease (IFD) were significantly reduced in the high compared with the low NK cell count group. There was no significant difference in rates of cytomegalovirus (CMV) and Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) infections between groups. There was no significant difference between groups in grades II and above acute graft versus host disease (GVHD), progression-free survival (PFS), or overall survival (OS).

Conclusion: A high number of NK cells in the graft may reduce febrile neutropenia, IFD and bacterial infection following haplo-PBSCT but it has no significant effect on aGVHD, PFS, or OS.

Keywords: Haploidentical peripheral blood stem cell transplantation; NK cells; febrile neutropenia; haplo-PBSCT.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that there are no conflicts of interest.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) for high and low natural killer (NK) cell count groups. PFS was calculated from transplant day to the date the disease relapsed and OS was calculated from disease onset to the day of death or last follow-up visit. There were no statistically significant differences between the two groups in PFS or OS.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

References

    1. Saliba RM, Veltri L, Rondon G, et al.. Impact of graft composition on outcomes of haploidentical bone marrow stem cell transplantation. Haematologica 2021; 106: 269–274. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Gu G, Yang JZ, Sun LX.Correlation of graft immune composition with outcomes after allogeneic stem cell transplantation: Moving towards a perfect transplant. Cell Immunol 2018; 323: 1–8. - PubMed
    1. Stikvoort A, Gaballa A, Solders M, et al.. Risk Factors for Severe Acute Graft-versus-Host Disease in Donor Graft Composition. Biol Blood Marrow Transplant 2018; 24: 467–477. - PubMed
    1. Svenberg P, Wang T, Uhlin M, et al.. The importance of graft cell composition in outcome after allogeneic stem cell transplantation in patients with malignant disease. Clin Transplant 2019; 33: e13537. - PubMed
    1. Zhang Y, Guo C, Sun C, et al.. High proportions of CD3+ T cells in grafts delayed lymphocyte recovery and reduced overall survival in haploidentical peripheral blood stem cell transplantation. Mol Clin Oncol 2020; 12: 574–580. - PMC - PubMed

MeSH terms

LinkOut - more resources