BLK Centre for BMT completes fastest 1,000 transplants in northern India

BLK Super Speciality Hospital achieved another milestone by crossing 1,000 bone marrow transplants. BLK Centre for BMT has emerged as Asia’s largest BMT unit and has completed the fastest 1,000 bone marrow transplants in northern India. Few patients who were part of this decade long journey marked their presence on the occasion.

Najm Aldeen (one year) 1000th patient, from Yemen marked his presence in the conference along with his family to share his story of successful treatment. Nasir Saleh, Grandfather of Najm said “We are thankful to BLK Super Speciality Hospital and Dr Dharma for giving a new lease of life to our child.” Najm was suffering from thalassemia major by birth and got his 100 per cent match unrelated donor through a voluntary international registry in Germany.

Credited for performing hundreds of high risks transplants, Dr Dharma Choudhary, Senior Consultant and Director, Centre for Hemato-oncology & Bone Marrow Transplant, BLK Super Speciality Hospital said, “With bone marrow transplants, we are successfully curing incurable diseases like leukaemia, myeloma, thalassemia and also improving the quality of life for the patients. It has emerged as an innovative option to fight critical and life-threatening diseases.

Performing a large number of transplants provides us with an edge to make the life-saving medical procedure safer and more effective for patients.”

Piyush Joshi, the first patient underwent bone marrow transplant in 2010 was also present on the occasion to share his testimony of 10 years post-transplant. Pushpa Joshi, mother of Piyush said, “We were scared earlier to know about the disease but after the transplant, now it’s almost 10 years and Piyush is perfectly fine and leading a normal life and going to school just like another children. We are thankful to Dr Dharma for the same.”

Not only kids but even the elderly got a new lease of life with state-of-the-art BMT facility. Dina Nath Ahuja (74), who was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukaemia in 2017 underwent BMT. He is currently more than two years post-transplant and leukaemia free.

Sharda Kohli (70) also underwent BMT for leukaemia seven years ago, narrated her pre- and post- BMT life and expressed gratitude to experts for giving them a new lease of life.

According to Dr Chaudhary, “Haemopoietic Stem Cell is sourced from Bone Marrow (BM), Peripheral Blood Stem Cell (PBSC) and Placental Umbilical cord Blood (P-UCB). Bone marrow transplant is a medical procedure under cellular therapy which includes allogeneic transplants (HLA match most important), blood group need not match, matched sibling, the best match for major and minor antigens. Another form of the procedure is autologous transplant and cord blood transplant. It is promising to note that matched unrelated-donor registeries now have over 10 million donors.”

Achieving a milestone by performing over 1,000 bone marrow transplants during the last decade, BLK Super Specialty Hospital’s Centre for Bone Marrow Transplant has also released the data

related to types of transplant procedures and treatment of critical diseases such as leukaemia, thalassemia and myeloma. Data shows the majority of patients who underwent BMT were suffering from leukaemia, thalassemia and myeloma.

As per the data released by the Centre, during 2010-2019, the Centre performed 1,020 BMT procedures which included treatment of 228 acute leukaemia, 223 thalassemia major, 189 multiple myeloma, 114 severe aplastic anaemia and 103 lymphomas, among others.

Out of these, 740 were allogenic transplants with 547 match-related donors and 28 match-unrelated donors including two cord blood transplants. The Centre also performed 280 autologous transplants where the blood stem cells from one’s own body are taken out and given back after very high doses of chemotherapy. Nearly 160 haploidentical transplant was yet another achievement.

“Bone marrow transplantation (BMT) is the only cure but non-availability of a suitable HLA matched donor, inherent high risk of the procedure restricts its practicality. However, the availability of highly-trained transplant experts and quality care have well-equipped us to handle a large number of rare procedures,” Dr Choudhary added.