Allogeneic Bone Marrow Transplantation for Acute Leukemia

To the Editor.—  In a recent issue of The Journal, Bortin and Rimm (240:1245, 1978) presented data concerning the treatment of acute leukemia by bone marrow transplantation. They concluded that there was no notable difference in the survival of patients who were in good or fair condition compared with those in poor or extremely poor condition before transplantation. This is in contrast with the results reported by Thomas et al¹ and with our own observations.Between May 1976 and July 1978, twenty patients (17 adults and three children) with acute leukemia were entered into our transplantation program. Candidacy for transplantation was prospectively evaluated using previously published criteria.¹ Eleven patients were considered to be good-risk candidates (four of them in complete remission and seven in partial remission or early relapse), and nine were poor-risk candidates (ie, in advanced relapse and refractory to drug therapy); two children were among the