Liver disease during the first post-transplant year in bone marrow transplantation recipients: retrospective study

Liver dysfunction is a common problem in BMT recipients and it is important to determine the etiology in order to institute appropriate therapy. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the possible causes of liver dysfunction during the first post-transplant year in BRIT recipients and to identify a possible relationship between pre-existing liver dysfunction and viral hepatitis with prognosis after BMT, We reviewed liver status before and after BMT in 130 consecutive patients at the Catholic Hematopoietic Stern Cell Transplantation Center, Liver dysfunction during the first post-transplant year occurred in 85 out of 101 (84.2%) allogeneic BMT recipients and 13 out of 29 (44.8%) autologous BMT recipients. In allogeneic BRIT, GVHD and drug hepatotoxicity were major causes, In autologous BRIT, drug hepatotoxicity was the most common cause. Eighteen out of 130 patients (13.8 %) had abnormal liver function tests before BRIT, These patients did not have an increased risk of post-transplant liver dysfunction, GVHD, and death compared to patients who had normal liver function tests prior to GMT, Nine patients were hepatitis B antigen positive and three patients were anti-I-ICV positive prior to BRIT. There was no significant increase in the incidence of post-transplant liver dysfunction, GVHD, and death in these patients.