Marrow Transplant Program Provides Twenty five Years of Excellence

The Marrow Transplant Unit opened its doors in August, 1982, and moved to its current location in the D&T Building at the VA Puget Sound Health Care System in 1985, doubling its patient care capacity.  

Since 1992 Thomas R. Chauncey, MD, has been the Director of the VA Puget Sound Marrow Transplant Program.   Throughout the years amid many changes and innovations, the program has continued to provide the same high quality of service that it has offered since its inception. 

About the Marrow Transplant Program

Pioneering clinical research projects performed at the VA Puget Sound Marrow Transplant Unit in conjunction with the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center (FHCRC) have helped to improve the safety and efficacy of marrow transplantation. Some of those studies were instrumental in establishing the efficacy of transplantation from unrelated donors, making curative treatments available to a broader number of patients.  When the FHCRC became affiliated with the University of Washington Medical Center and Children's Hospital and Medical Center to create the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance (SCCA) the VA Puget Sound continued its relationship with the SCCA to provide services for our patients.  Services offered to Veterans at the VA Puget Sound include autologous, sibling and unrelated donor transplants.

Since 1982 the VA Puget Sound has performed almost 1000 transplants. Currently 45-55 transplants per year are performed in an eight-bed unit.  Pre and post-transplant services are provided for outpatients in a separate room within the unit.  Long-term follow-up care and advice is also provided for post-transplant patients throughout the country. As the numbers of transplant survivors has increased, so has the awareness of the need for programs to enhance quality of life.  Investigation into common problems faced by post-transplant recipients has lead to increasing attention to prevention and treatment of long-term side effects.

As the VA Puget Sound MTU has gained experience in unrelated transplantation and the prominence of the National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP) has grown, there is an increasing public awareness of the option for unrelated transplantation. Since 1988 the VA Puget Sound has performed nearly 170 transplants from unrelated donor sources. Survival data for these patients as well as those receiving other types of transplants compares favorably to published data in the medical literature.

With the addition of transplant programs at the Audie Murphy Memorial Veterans Hospital in San Antonio, where autologous and matched sibling donor transplants are performed, and at the Nashville VAMC, where autologous, matched sibling and unrelated donor transplants are also performed, the national VA Marrow Transplant Program continues to grow and expand its capability to meet the transplant needs of Veterans throughout the country.