Abstract

It is not known whether obesity has a differential effect on allogeneic haematopoietic cell transplantation outcomes with alternative donor types. We report the results of a retrospective registry study examining the effect of obesity [body mass index (BMI) > 30] on outcomes with alternative donors (haploidentical related donor with two or more mismatches and receiving post-transplant cyclophosphamide [haplo] and cord blood (CBU)] versus matched unrelated donor (MUD). Adult patients receiving haematopoietic cell transplantation for haematologic malignancy (2013-2017) (N = 16 182) using MUD (n = 11 801), haplo (n = 2894) and CBU (n = 1487) were included. The primary outcome was non-relapse mortality (NRM). The analysis demonstrated a significant, non-linear interaction between pretransplant BMI and the three donor groups for NRM: NRM risk was significantly higher with CBU compared to haplo at BMI 25-30 [hazard ratio (HR) 1.66-1.71, p < 0.05] and mud transplants at a bmi of 25-45 (hr, 1.61-3.47, p >< 0.05). the results demonstrated that nrm and survival outcomes are worse in overweight and obese transplant recipients (bmi ≥ 25) with one alternative donor type over mud, although obesity does not appear to confer a uniform differential mortality risk with one donor type over the other. bmi may serve as a criterion for selecting a donor among the three (mud, haplo and cbu) options, if matched sibling donor is not available.>

DOI 10.1111/BJH.18108