Successful bone marrow transplantation in sensitized recipients.

Fourteen patients with aplastic anemia and one with the Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome who were specifically sensitized against their donors were successfully engrafted with bone marrow from those donors. Sensitivity was detected in antibody-independent and antibody-dependent cell-mediated lysis assays. In order to erase this immunity to non-MHR familial transplantation antigens, multiagent immunosuppression with cyclophosphamide, procarbazine, and whole rabbit antithymocyte serum (ATS) was used. The data suggest that ATS was largely responsible for abrogation of this sensitivity and indicate that immunity does not represent a barrier to successful transplantation.