Clinical outcome of FLAG-IDA chemotherapy sequential with Flu–Bu3 conditioning regimen in patients with refractory AML: a parallel study from Shanghai Institute of Hematology and Institut Paoli-Calmettes

The purpose of the study was to evaluate the feasibility of conditioning regimen with sequential chemotherapy (FLAG-IDA), followed by Fludarabine (5 days) + Busulfan (3 days) by parallel analysis of patients with refractory acute myeloid leukemia (AML) from two transplantation centers in China and France. A total of 47 refractory AML with median bone marrow blast of 35% (1–90%) and median age at 42 years (16–62) were enrolled. Thirteen patients received peripheral stem cell transplantation (HSCT) from HLA-matched sibling donor, while 18 and 16 from unrelated or haplo-identical donors, respectively. With a median follow-up of 24.3 months (1–70), 13 patients relapsed at a median time of 5.1 months (2.2–18.0) and 24 patients died due to relapse ( n = 12) or non-relapsed mortality (NRM, n = 12). The estimated 3-year RR and NRM were 33.5 ± 5.7% and 25.7 ± 4.2%, respectively. The estimated 3-year overall survival (OS) and event-free survival (EFS) were 43.8 ± 7.8% and 42.3 ± 7.8%. In multivariate analysis, age (