Increased incidence of cytomegalovirus disease after autologous CD34- selected peripheral blood stem cell transplantation

High-dose therapy with autologous peripheral blood stem cell (PBSC) rescue is widely used for the treatment of malignant disease. CD34 selection of PBSC has been applied as a means of reducing contamination of the graft. Although CD34 selection results in a 2 to 3 log reduction in contaminating tumor cells without significantly delaying engraftment, many other types of cells are depleted from the CD34-enriched grafts and immune reconstitution may be impaired. In the present study, 31 cytomegalovirus (CMV)-seropositive patients who received myeloablative therapy followed by the infusion of CD34- selected autologous PBSC were assessed for the development of CMV disease in the first 100 days posttransplant. Seven patients (22.6%) developed CMV disease and 4 patients (12.9%) died from complications of their infection. In a contemporaneous group of 237 CMV-seropositive patients receiving unselected, autologous PBSC, only 10 patients (4.2%) developed CMV disease, with 5 deaths (2.1%). In a multivariate logistic regression analysis, the use of CD34-selected autologous PBSC after high-dose therapy was associated with a marked increase in the incidence of CMV disease and CMV-associated deaths.