[A successful allogeneic bone marrow transplantation for acute promyelocytic leukemia with anthracycline-induced cardiomyopathy at relapse].

A 14-year-old girl with acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL) developed cardiomyopathy following chemotherapy for remission induction and subsequent consolidation consisting of cumulative doses of 644 mg/m2 of daunorubicin and 31 mg/m2 of mitoxantrone. Six months after the first complete remission, when relapse of APL was recognized an allogeneic bone marrow transplantation (BMT) from her HLA-identical brother was performed. A preconditioning regimen, consisting of cytarabine (Ara-C, 2 g/m2/day x 3 days and 4 g/m2/day x 3 days), total body irradiation (TBI, 1200 cGy) and etoposide (VP-16, 50 mg/kg) caused moderate gastrointestinal symptoms and transient hemorrhagic cystitis, but did not worsen her cardiac function. Both continuous intravenous administration of heparin to control DIC and continuous low dose dopamine infusion to prevent cardiac failure achieved their purpose. The patient is leukemia-free and has no symptoms related to cardiomyopathy at the eight month after BMT. A preconditioning regimen (Ara-C, TBI and VP-16) appeared to be suitable for BMT to a patient with anthracycline-induced cardiomyopathy.