Access Program Information
<p>Subjects have a type of blood cell cancer, other blood disease or a genetic disease for which they received a stem cell transplant. After transplant while the immune system grows back the subjects have an infection with one or more of three viruses – <strong>Epstein Barr virus (EBV), cytomegalovirus (CMV) or adenovirus</strong> – that has persisted or come back despite standard therapy. Adenovirus is a virus that causes symptoms of a common cold normally but can cause serious life-threatening infections in patients who have weak immune systems. It usually affects the lungs and can cause a very serious pneumonia, but it can also affect the gut, the liver, the pancreas and the eyes. CMV is a virus that can also cause serious infections in patients with suppressed immune systems. It usually affects the lungs and can cause a very serious pneumonia, but it can also affect the intestinal tract, the liver and the eyes. Approximately 2/3 of normal people harbor this virus in their body. In healthy people CMV rarely causes any problems because the immune system can keep it under control. If the subject and/or the subject’s donor are positive for CMV, s/he is at risk of developing CMV disease while his/her immune system is weak post transplant. EBV is the virus that causes glandular fever or kissing disease. It is also normally controlled by a healthy immune system, but when the immune system is weak, it can cause fevers, enlarged lymph nodes and sometimes develop into a type of cancer called lymphoma. This treatment with specially trained T cells (called CTLs) has had activity against these viruses when the cells are made from the transplant donor. However, as it takes 2-3 months to make the cells, that approach is not practical when the subject already has an infection. We want to find out if we can use CTLs which have already been made from another donor that match the subject and his/her donor as closely as possible and if the CTLs will last in the body and have activity against these viruses. In a recent study these cells were given to 50 patients with viral infections post transplant and over 70% had a complete or partial response. The purpose of this study is to make CTL lines leftover from that previous study available to patients with viral infections that have not responded to standard treatments. These virus-specific CTLs are an investigational product not approved by the FDA.</p>