Ganciclovir treatment failure in adult allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplant recipients with cytomegalovirus infection - a single centre experience
Abstract
To determine the incidence of infection with ganciclovir-resistant cytomegalovirus (CMV) in adult allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplant (HSCT) recipients. Clinical resistance or treatment failure was defined as persistent DNAemia or increasing viral load in peripheral blood after 2 weeks of virostatic treatment.
The association between the treatment failure and viral resistance was analysed. The presence of ganciclovir - resistant CMV strains was confirmed by genotypic testing able to detect mutations conferring resistance.
The low incidence of genetically confirmed ganciclovir-resistant CMV isolates in HSCT recipients with relatively common clinical treatment failure suggests that the mechanism underlying slower viral clearance is often other than mutations conferring ganciclovir resistance to the virus.