Why Peripheral Blood Stem Cells?
There are several reasons and advantages for using peripheral blood stem cells (PBSC) instead of bone marrow for transplantation. Sometimes PBSC are used to add to the stem cells collected from a bone marrow harvest. Other times, a patient’s bone marrow may be contaminated with cancerous cells; PBSC are then used in the hope that these cells are not similarly contaminated. Prior radiation to the pelvic area, or chemotherapy, can also reduce the number of stem cells available for bone marrow harvest. Also, PBSC can be collected without the use of general anesthesia, and the procedure is usually performed on an outpatient basis with little or no discomfort during, or after, the collection. Most importantly, more stem cells can often be collected from the peripheral blood than from the bone marrow. As a result, blood count recovery is faster after PBSC transplant than after bone marrow transplant. This faster recovery translates into lower risk for the patient and fewer complications.
