Growth in children after bone marrow transplantation for advanced neuroblastoma compared with growth after transplantation for leukemia or aplastic anemia.

The linear growth of 26 children with progressive and advanced neuroblastoma treated with high-dose chemotherapy, total body irradiation, and bone marrow transplantation between 1978 and 1988 at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia was compared with the growth of 33 children who had transplants for leukemia and of 12 who had transplants for aplastic anemia. The mean growth velocity, expressed as a standard deviation score, for the children who underwent bone marrow transplantation for neuroblastoma was -2.83. This was significantly (p less than 0.005) less than the standard deviation scores for children with transplants for acute lymphoblastic leukemia, acute nonlymphocytic leukemia, and aplastic anemia, which were -0.98, -0.07, and -1.05, respectively. A 6-year follow-up study of 32 long-term survivors of cancer revealed that the 11 patients with neuroblastoma continued to grow poorly, whereas a comparison group of 21 survivors of bone marrow transplantation for leukemia had essentially normal growth 2 years after the procedure. Major therapeutic differences between the two groups included the doses of local radiotherapy and the type and number of cytotoxic agents used. In comparison with the relatively mild growth-inhibiting effects of preparative regimens for leukemia and aplastic anemia, the very intensive preparative regimens used in patients with neuroblastoma have significant negative effects on growth.