Monoclonal Antibodies to Treat Graft-Versus-Host Disease

A.      M. Carella; G.      D'Arena; N.      Cascavilla

Abstract

To date, Graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) represents one of the most important complications of allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT). GVHD is one of the major determinants of transplant-related mortality and it also may be an additional cause that affects patients late outcome. Despite of the development of new and advanced Human Leukocyte Antigens (HLA) matching techniques, this complication occurs in approximately 50-80% of patients who underwent allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation, and it is responsible for one-third of deaths after transplantation. Moreover, GVHD occurrence, if moderate, may strongly contribute to the eradication of residual malignant cells which survived after myeloablative conditioning regimen, allowing the patients to have a reduced risk of relapse so that the presence of this complication may have a determinant role for the allogeneic transplantation outcome through the so-called graft-versus-tumor (GVT) effect.

Keywords: GVHD, acute, chronic, therapy, alemtuzumab, rituximab, monoclonal antibodies, Graft-versus-host disease, allogeneic, hematopoietic stem cell transplantation, HSCT, HLA, Human Leukocyte Antigens