There has always been a question ‘what is the upper age limit for bone marrow transplant in a blood cancer patient’. Should it be below 60 or up to 70 years of age?
A cancer specialist at Jaipur’s Apex Hospital’s Comprehensive Oncology Care defied the age limit by treating a 65-year-old woman suffering from Multiple Myeloma (blood cancer) with the transplantation of her own cells of bone marrow early this month.
The bone marrow transplant is a procedure of infusing healthy blood-forming stem cells into the body of a patient to replace that bone marrow that’s not producing enough healthy blood cells. The procedure is also called stem cell transplant.
The female patient from Bhilwara, suffering from ‘Relapse Multiple Myeloma’ had pathological fracture with hematology parameters like haemoglobin, RBC, WBC, Platelets on the lower side, Dr Ashish Verma, consultant Hemato-Oncologist told The Statesman here on Monday.
She was though healthy enough to bear the oncology procedures since August last year, complained of symptoms like weakness, body pain, and poor appetite, Dr Verma said.
The patient was treated with salvage chemotherapy with four cycles in August last year before undergoing ‘Autologous Bone Marrow Transplant’, Dr Verma, who led a team to treat her, said.
The patient’s upper stem cells, which were normal, were used in the procedure with high dose of Conditioning Regime Chemotherapy, he said, adding with the treatment, her disease would be in remission for a long time/life-long.
She has been prescribed multi vitamins and other normal drugs, and will recover in the next three months, he claimed.
On being asked what prompted him to prescribe the procedure for such an aged patient, he said, “There is no age limit for a bone marrow transplant; the biggest factor that determines whether or not someone would be eligible for this treatment is their health. She was found fit after the salvage chemotherapy in four cycles.”