The European Blood and Marrow Transplantation Textbook for Nurses

Discharge from inpatient care

Readmissions to hospital

Paediatric considerations

Chapter 11. Graft versus Host Disease (GvHD)

John Murray, Jacqui Stringer

Brief description

Acute vs Chronic and other categories

Assessment criteria

Differential diagnoses

Principles of treatment and care

Treatments – old, new, supportive and complementary

Paediatric considerations

Chapter 12. Graft versus Tumour effect

MRD and what it means

Chimerism testing 

Care of the relapsed patient

Early vs late relapse

Chapter 13. Graft failure and rejection

Principles of care

Differences

Treatment options

Paediatric considerations

Chapter 14. Late effects and long term follow-up

Michelle Kenyon, John Murray, Jacqui Stringer, Diana Greenfield

Principles of care

Michelle Kenyon works as the Elimination of Leukaemia Fund (ELF) Post BMT Clinical Nurse Specialist at King’s College Hospital London. She has worked for more than 25 years in the field of Haemato-oncology and Stem Cell Transplantation. Her interest in improving the patient experience of Haematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation (HSCT) led her to write “The Seven Steps”, a patient information book (2002) and subsequently the “Next Steps” (2012). Around 50,000 copies of these titles have been distributed, and are now used as the basis of informed consent for transplant recipients throughout the UK.

She studied her BSc in Cancer Nursing and MSc in Advancing Cancer Nursing Practice at King’s College London, and undertook an empirical research study exploring the use of Life-coaching in Stem Cell Transplant Survivors for her dissertation. She supports patients throughout their post-transplant recovery and has a particular interest in survivorship issues and the effects of treatment. She launched the HSCT long-term follow-up clinic at King’s College Hospital in 2014 and has found the patient insights inspiring and the overall experience highly rewarding. She is the nurse representative on the BSBMT executive, Vice Chair EBMT (UK) NAP group and is Secretary of the EBMT NG. 

Aleksandra Babic is a nurse manager, affiliate to Oncology Institute of Southern Switzerland (IOSI), in Bellinzona, as Transplant Unit Coordinator and Quality manager. She received her nurse diploma from the College Center of Professional Formation in Dubrovnik, Croatia, in 1988, and was awarded a Master’s degree in Nurse Management in 2006. Until 2016 she worked as a nurse manager in apheresis unit at IEO, European Institute of Oncology in Milan and has published papers on peripheral blood stem cell collection and mobilization (i.e. R-ESHAP plus pegfilgrastim as an effective peripheral stem cell mobilization regimen for autologous stem-cell transplantation in patients with relapsed/refractory diffuse large B-cell lymphoma. Transfus Apher Sci. 2013.  Successful mobilisation of peripheral blood stem cells in children using plerixafor: a case report and review of the literature. Blood Transfus. 2013. Who should be really considered as a poor mobilizer in the plerixafor era? Transfus Apher Sci. 2012 )  and photopheresis (i.e. Efficacy of photopheresis extracorporeal procedure as single treatment for severe chronic GVHD: A case report’, Transfusion and Apheresis Science, 2013). In addition, Aleksandra has presented at a number of conferences worldwide, most recently including the GIIMA 3rd National Conference, GITMO and the EBMT 2015 conference: Validation of PBSC collection within JACIE program: A multicenter evaluation. From 2016 she is also a Jacie Quality Manager Inspector.

Aleksandra is the former EBMT NG President (European Blood and Marrow Transplant Society) Nurses Group, which includes more than 800 nurses in 64 countries worldwide. She is a former President of GIIMA, the Italian Nurses Group in Mobilisation and Aphaeresis, and the founder and a board member of the not-for-profit association, Nurses No Frontiers.