In the last four years we established five long term cultures from tumor material of Hodgkin's disease. The in vitro cells have malignant characteristics and represent the in vivo H- and SR-cells. Common immunological, functional and morphological assays did not characterize the in vitro cells to be a known cell type of lymphoid, myeloid or monocytoid tissue. The in vitro Hodgkin cells are biologically active by producing factors involved in regulation and promotion of immunological response and granulopoiesis. The relevance of the findings for pathogenesis and clinical appearance of Hodgkin's disease is discussed.

Cell Line↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Infectious complications after allogeneic bone marrow transplantation with and without T-cell depletion of donor marrow.

The infectious complications during different time intervals after allogeneic bone marrow transplantation (BMT) (day 0 to day 30, 31 to 100, 101 to 365, 366 to 730) were reviewed in 67 adult patients, 27 of whom received transplants without T-cell depletion (TCD) using methotrexate or cyclosporin A for prophylaxis of graft-versus-host disease (GvHD) and 40 of whom received donor marrow with TCD using the monoclonal anti-lymphocyte antibody campath-1 and human complement. The use of TCD reduced the incidence and severity of GvHD significantly (p less than 0.01), but was associated with an increased rate of graft rejections. During all time intervals patients with TCD had a similar, lower or statistically significantly lower number of bacterial, fungal or viral infections and a statistically significantly lower number of lethal infections (p = 0.05) as compared with patients without TCD. This finding might be explained by the fact that with TCD immunological reconstitution can take place unimpaired by GvHD or its prophylaxis or treatment, resulting in a decreased incidence of infections.

Adult↗