Successful bone marrow transplantation with a matched unrelated donor in an acute promyelocytic leukemia patient after reinduction therapy with arsenic trioxide

Abstract

A 44-year-old man with relapsed acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL), refractory to all-trans-retinoic acid (ATRA), daunorubicin, and cytosine arabinoside, was treated with arsenic trioxide (ATO). ATO was given intravenously at a dose of 0.15 mg/kg/day for 20 days, and the patient achieved complete remission. No serious adverse events related to ATO infusion were observed. He received ATO for 10 days as consolidation therapy and subsequently underwent HLA-matched unrelated donor stem cell transplantation. He remains in molecular remission 10 months after transplant. This case suggests that ATO could be a useful therapy prior to allogeneic stem cell transplantation in relapsed APL.