Dmitry Rogachev National Research Center of Pediatric Hematology, Oncology and Immunology has run out of consumables for cell therapy (CAR-T-therapy) on Miltenyi Biotec equipment used for the Center’s oncohematological and bone marrow transplantation patients.
According to Aleksey Maschan, Deputy Director General of Rogachev Center and Director of the Institute of Hematology, Immunology and Cell Technologies of the Center, the patients were switched from their treatment to other methods.
“There are no alternative supplies and there will not be any. This technology was provided by a single manufacturer. Some companies are working in this direction, but it is still a long way to go,” Maschan said to Meditsinsky Vestnik.
As he explained, the technique to which the patients were transferred is widely used in the world in connection with bone marrow transplantation from donors. The issue concerns medicamental prevention of transplant rejection; the treatment is based on the use of post-transplant cyclophosphamide.
Aleksey Maschan stressed that such therapy is more toxic, causes a higher percentage of complications, and the number of transplants that can be performed over a period of time is lower. Six patients have received it in the Rogachev Center over the past two months. The forced transition to drug therapy with cyclophosphamide may affect the number of treated patients.
“The center used to perform 196-200 transplants from donors every year. Of these, there were about 170 transplants with Miltenyi Biotec equipment, which is not available for us now. We cannot predict yet how the other method will work and how many children we’ll be able to treat, there are no such forecasts,” the deputy director of the Center told the publication.
The fact that Germany’s Miltenyi Biotec suspended the supply of equipment for oncotherapy to Russia became known at the end of March.
Immediately after that, the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation said that specialists are ready to deal with the termination of CAR-T technologies and equipment supply.
