Engraftment Syndrome: An Updated Review

Engraftment syndrome is a constellation of clinical manifestations that occur at the time of neutrophil recovery following hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. There are several risk factors, but the reports on some of them are rather conflicting. Additionally, not only the clinical manifestations but also the laboratory findings are nonspecific and may overlap with several conditions such as acute graft versus host disease, drug toxicity, radiation-induced damage and infectious disorders. Treatment of symptomatic and severe forms is similar to that of graft versus host disease. Hence, there is a need for: revision of the diagnostic criteria, establishment of scoring system to determine prognosis and to direct therapy as well as the addition new criteria to differentiate it from other similar conditions.