DID you know that the socioeconomic background of a donor may affect the success of hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HCT)? In a new, eye-opening study by Lucie M Turcotte et al, University of Minnesota Medical School, Minneapolis, USA, researchers concluded that low socioeconomic status elevated the risks of immune dysfunction, and overall survival, for patients receiving stem cell transplants for cancer. Stem cell or bone marrow transplants can be used to treat some types of cancers such as leukemia, lymphoma and myeloma.
For the study, the team analysed the health outcomes of 2,005 HCT recipients who were transplanted for hematologic malignancy at 125 United States transplant centres and tested whether their outcomes differed as a function of their cell donor’s SES (controlling for other known HCT-related risk factors).
The findings were surprising; recipients transplanted with cells from donors in the lowest quartile of SES experienced a 9.7% reduction in overall survival (P=0.001) and 6.6% increase in treatment-related mortality within three years (P=0.008) compared to those transplanted from donors in the highest SES quartile.
‘These results are consistent with previous research linking socioeconomic disadvantage to altered immune cell function and haematopoiesis, and they reveal an unanticipated persistence of those effects after cells are transferred into a new host environment’. For the future, Turcotte urged for more research to better underpin why this association occurs, and develop interventions to improve the health of both HCT donors and recipients.
Helena Bradbury, EMJ
Reference
Turcotte LM et al. The health risk of social disadvantage is transplantable into a new host. PNAS. 2024;121(30):e2404108121.
