The increase of the global donor inventory is of limited benefit to patients of non-Northwestern European descent.

ABSTRACT: Between 2001 and 2012, the number of unrelated donors registered worldwide increased from 7 to 21 million, and the number of public cord blood units increased to over 500,000. We addressed the question of whether this expansion resulted in higher percentages of patients reaching transplantation. Unrelated donor searches were evaluated for 3,124 eligible patients in the Netherlands in two cohorts (2001-2006, n=995; 2007-2012, n=2129), comparing results for patients of Northwestern European and non-Northwestern European origin. Endpoints were 'donor found' and 'transplantation reached'. The substantial growth of the donor inventory over the period studied did not increase the median number of potential unrelated donors (n=7) for non-Northwestern European patients, but almost doubled the numb

SUBMITTER: van Walraven SM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5210248 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature