What Are the Types of Bone Marrow Transplantation?
In an autologous transplant, stem cells from your own peripheral blood or bone marrow are collected (harvested). They are placed in frozen storage (cryopreserved) prior to treatment of the cancer with high-dose chemotherapy. Once chemotherapy treatment is complete, the stem cells are reinfused (put back into your body). The stem cells will restore the bone marrow. The new blood marrow can restore production of red and white blood cells and platelets. Prior to reinfusion, healthy stem cells are separated from any cancer cells that may be present in the harvested bone marrow. This is done to avoid reintroducing cancer cells into the bone marrow. However, it has never been shown that this filtering process is either required or effective.
