Can High Dose Therapy Change the Course of Low Grade Lymphoma? A Study Considering Patients as Their Own Control.

Low grade lymphoma patients (pts) have an indolent evolution with median survival ranging between 8–10 years. During disease’s course, high dose therapy (HDT) and autologous stem-cell transplantation (ASCT) can be considered as an alternative to sequential chemotherapies. However, efficacy of this strategy remains controversial. The purpose of our study is to evaluate ASCT efficacy by comparing retrospectively for each pts disease free survival (DFS) after ASCT with DFS observed with pts’ last chemotherapy regimen (LCR) just before intensification. Between apr 1988 and feb 2002, 109 low grade lymphoma pts were treated with HDT and ASCT in our department, 61 were male, the median age was 49 yrs [range 28–65]. Histological subtypes were mostly follicular small cell (86 %). At time of diagnosis, LDH were normal for 85 pts; 60 pts had high tumor burden. IPI was 0 for 16 %, 1 for 70 % and 2 for 14 %. Prior to ASCT, pts had experienced a median of 2 progressions (range 1 to 5). At time of graft, 102 pts present complete or partial response and 7 pts present stable disease. Two principal intensification chemo regimens were used before ASCT: VP16/cyclophosphamide in 84 pts and BEAM in 12. TBI was associated for 86 pts. At June 2002, the median follow up was 6.4 yrs from diagnosis and 4.5 yrs from ASCT. 3 years after ASCT, survival rate was 72 % and DFS rate was 50 %. Median DFS decreased with nb of progression (p=0.02):

Median DFS according to nb of progression

Considering pt with more than 1 progression (n=92) as his own control, DFS was longer after ASCT than after LCR for 61 % of pts. Median DFS was 2.5 yrs after ASCT and 2.0 yrs after LCR. At 3 yrs, DFS rate was 48 % after ASCT and 37 % after LCR (p<0,001):

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This study demonstrates that HDT and ASCT significantly increase DFS in comparison with the LCR for low grade lymphoma patients. Such methodology could be useful to evaluate new strategy incorporating monoclonal antibody.