Pre-Transplant: Intro

Congratulations!  You’ve finished your preliminary tests, they’ve been evaluated by your Transplant team, and you’ve been accepted into the transplant program.  This is when the actual transplant procedures begin.  For the next three to six weeks you will be scheduled for some additional tests and pre-transplant treatments, all on an out-patient basis.  These tests are no longer used for qualification, but will instead provide a baseline to compare and contrast to your post-transplant tests as the team measures your progress back to ‘normal’.  The treatments are all out-patient prep work for the transplant itself.


One piece of advice for these tests; dress in loose comfortable, easy to change clothes.  If you’re a woman, wear a sports bra with no metal in it – this will speed up the tests and make for an easy transition from one department to the next.


** Note: If you’re getting a bone marrow transplant or allenegeic stem cell transplant, your potential donors will also be evaluated at this time to see if they’re a match.  The donor tests involves both lab work and a bone marrow biopsy, both of which you yourself will undergo during this section of the transplant procedure.  Because an acceptable donor must be identified, this part of the transplant procedure may take longer to complete for a bone marrow or allegeneic stem cell transplant patient.  If you have a bone marrow donor, the harvesting of bone marrow will take place at the end of this schedule, around the same time that an autologous (donor-less) stem cell patient will be harvesting their own stem cells.



Each of the tests are hot-linked in the Pre-Transplant page.