Cataracts after total body irradiation and marrow transplantation: a sparing effect of dose fractionation

Two hundred seventy-seven patients, who have been followed for 1 to 12 years after marrow transplantation, have been examined for cataract development. In preparation for transplantation, 96 patients with aplastic anemia were conditioned with chemotherapy only, while 181 patients (two with aplastic anemia and 179 with a hematologic malignancy) were conditioned with a regimen of total body irradiation (TBI) and chemotherapy. TBI was delivered from two opposing 60Co sources at an exposure rate of 4 to 8 cGy/min, either as a single dose of 10 Gy (105 patients) or in fractions (76 patients). To date, 86 patients have developed cataracts. Kaplan-Meier product limit estimates of the incidence of cataracts for patients given chemotherapy only and no TBI, single-dose TBI, and fractionated TBI are 19, 80, 18%, respectively. On the basis of proportional hazards regression analyses, patients given single-dose TBI had a relative risk of developing cataracts that was 4.7-fold higher than in patients given fractionated TBI or chemotherapy only, suggesting a significant sparing effect with use of TBI dose fractionation