Prevention of infections in bone marrow transplant recipients.

Bone marrow transplantation (BMT) is increasingly used in the treatment of hematologic malignancies, solid tumors, and congenital diseases. The number of patients receiving a BMT increased from approximately 5000 in 1989 to 12,000 in 1995. Infectious complications are the most common cause of morbidity and mortality in the peritransplant period in patients undergoing autologous BMT. Additionally, infectious complications are a serious cause of complications in recipients of matched sibling allogeneic BMT, unrelated BMT, and related mismatched BMT.