Drugs/Therapy
Avoiding High-Dose Chemotherapy and Radiation Successfully Treated CDA Patient [VIDEO]
Physicians have managed to successfully treat and document an adult with congenital dyserythropoietic anemia. The treatment included a technique that avoided the use of high-doses of chemotherapy and radiation prior to a stem cell transplant.
David Levy was successfully cured of his congenital dyserythropoietic anemia, or CDA, after being treated at the University of Illinois Hospital and Health Sciences System. His condition is a rare blood disorder where the body does not produce enough red blood cells. Such conditions may cause degeneration of organs leading to early death, the Science Daily reported.
The stem cell transplant technique used for the procedure was unique because it allowed a donor's cells to gradually take over the bone marrow of Levy without using any form of toxic agents. Toxic agents are used to eliminating a patient's cells prior to the stem cell transplant. With the minimal use of chemotherapy, doctors were able to perform the risky procedure.
Dr. Damiano Rondelli further explains that the treatment became successful because Levy was sick enough to be able to qualify for such a risky procedure. According to him, may adult patients with blood disorder are rarely given such treatment options because some of them are either too sick or not sick enough to tolerate the toxic drugs that are used alongside the stem cell transplant, the CNBC quotes.
Levy started to experience the symptoms that came with CDA when he was 24. The pain he had experienced was so severe that he had to withdraw from graduate school, avoided work and had no social contact. He was forced to do such to be able to manage the pain and get his health back.
Levy started sending e-mails to Dr. Rondelli when he reached 32. During that time, due to his blood disorder, Levy was having transfusions 2 to 3 times a week, had already lost his spleen and had an enlarged liver. He was also suffering from severe fatigue, heart palpitations, and iron poisoning.
Rondelli performed Levy's transplant back in 2014. Now Levy is living a normal life at 35.
He claims that he still has some pain and other lingering issues due to his condition for years but he was able to go back to school to finish his Doctorate in Psychology. At present, he is running group therapy sessions at a behavioral health hospital.
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