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EBMT 2026 | IgG and immune competence after stem cell transplant in pediatric sickle cell disease
Alexander Ngwube, MD, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX, shares insights into immunoglobulin G (IgG) levels and immune competence after stem cell transplant in pediatric patients with sickle cell disease (SCD). Dr Ngwube highlights that in this setting, normal IgG levels do not confer pneumococcal protection, underscoring the need to monitor patients and ensure they receive revaccination if necessary. This interview took place at the 52nd Annual Meeting of the EBMT in Madrid, Spain.
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Transcript
This is an interesting finding. I think at the back of our minds, you know, our patients with sickle cell disease post-transplant, they tend to have high IgG levels. And in everybody’s mind, they’re like, wow, they’ve recovered fast. They’re going to do fine. And then we did this study for us to find out that about 40% of those patients, when we tested their pneumococcal vaccine response, we found that it was lacking...
This is an interesting finding. I think at the back of our minds, you know, our patients with sickle cell disease post-transplant, they tend to have high IgG levels. And in everybody’s mind, they’re like, wow, they’ve recovered fast. They’re going to do fine. And then we did this study for us to find out that about 40% of those patients, when we tested their pneumococcal vaccine response, we found that it was lacking. And this is in spite of the fact that they had very good IgG levels leading up to when they got the vaccine. And so it makes us think that these patients are still leaky. Our patients with sickle cell disease, they have this background inflammatory reaction, and they’re still leaky. They still have produced a lot of this, what I would call, useless immunoglobulins that kind of falsifies the picture that they’re alright. And so I think the take-home message there is that our patients with sickle cell disease, post-transplant, you should watch them closely. We should ensure that they get their revaccination and ensure that they are actually having a good response to the vaccinations.
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Disclosures
Vertex Therapeutics (paid consultant one-time, ended November 2025) and Beam Therapeutics (paid consultant one-time, ended December 2025).
