[Anesthesia and bone marrow harvesting in children].

Allogeneic bone marrow transplantation is increasingly used to treat a great variety of disorders which range from genetic conditions to leukaemia. Most often, the donor is a healthy sibling of the patient. Bone marrow harvesting in young children is a very painful procedure requiring anaesthesia; this presents yet more risk for the donor. In order to analyse the specific problems related to this procedure, a retrospective study was carried out on 30 anaesthetic records of marrow-harvesting procedures performed between January 1980 and December 1987. The 30 harvests were carried out in 28 patients (15 boys, 13 girls). Mean age of donors was 6 +/- 0.8 yr (range: 13 months to 17 yr). Twenty-seven patients were classed ASA I and one ASA II. The harvests were all carried out in prone and intubated patients. The volume of removed marrow was 350 +/- 80 ml (range 170 to 600 ml). This was equivalent to a mean 21% estimated blood volume (6-37%). Blood transfusion with phenotyped irradiated blood was carried out in 18 patients, and with autologous blood in one. Mean duration of the procedure was 88 +/- 6 min and the mean stay in hospital was three days. The potential risks for the children are discussed, as well as the related legal problems.