Most patients receive chemotherapy from their oncologist.
The type of chemotherapy varies from disease to disease. The more chemotherapy that is given before collecting bone marrow cells the less disease burden there is likely to be. However, chemotherapy often damages the bone marrow as well and may limit our ability to collect enough to do a transplant. Therefore, the amount of chemotherapy given before transplant should be the minimum to get the cancer under control. Prolonged use of some types of chemotherapy can cause extensive damage to the bone marrow and these drugs are best avoided if possible.