Madhya Pradesh

• 02 Apr 2022

Establishment of Stem Cell Therapy Based Bone Marrow Transplant and Pediatric Cancer Unit

Why in News?

On April 1, 2022, Madhya Pradesh Medical Education Minister Vishwas Kailash Sarang informed that stem cell therapy based bone marrow transplant and pediatric cancer unit would be established in the state.

Key Points

• Bone marrow transplant and pediatric cancer units will be established in four medical colleges of Madhya Pradesh namely Bhopal, Jabalpur, Gwalior and Rewa.
• A bone marrow transplant unit will be established in the state for the treatment of genetic diseases of children like sickle cell anemia, aplastic anemia, thalassemia and cancers like leukemia, multiple myeloma, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.
• In the first phase, a 6 bedded bone marrow transplant unit and a 24 bedded pediatric cancer unit will be set up in Gandhi Medical College.
• World class medical facilities will be made available through this unit. In this, self (autologous) stem cell grafting and other person's (allogeneic) bone marrow will be transplanted.
• Due to genetic diseases like sickle cell anemia, aplastic anemia and thalassemia in children, the infected bone marrow of children will be removed and a healthy bone marrow of another person will be transplanted.
• For transplanting bone marrow of affected children, the primary donors are siblings of the children, who have a more than 25 percent chance of matching the bone marrow.
• Autologous stem cell transplant will be done in patients suffering from cancers such as leukemia, multiple myeloma, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma by removing their own stem cells. The stem cells of the affected patient will be removed and cryo-preserved. Then an autologous transplant will be done.