The lack of widely-used standardized diagnostic criteria may impair both the true evaluation of chronic graft-versus-host disease and the correlation of its severity with transplant-related mortality. At the I Consensus of the Brazilian Society of Bone Marrow Transplantation - SBTMO that took place in June 2009, the Group of GVHD Studies Brazil-Seattle (GEDECH), presented the guidelines for diagnosis, classification, prophylaxis and treatment of chronic GVHD as proposed by the National Institutes of Health and based on the reality in Brazilian Centers. These proposals, including standardization of features used in diagnosis and tools to score involved organs and to assess the overall severity, should be used in clinical studies of chronic graft-versus-host disease. These criteria are useful to better analyze the incidence of this disease, in addition to evaluate the extension of the involvement of organs or the site affected and its influence on late transplantation mortality. Prophylaxis and treatment proposed for this important complication of hematopoietic stem cell transplantations were discussed and graded according to the levels of evidence established by the National Institutes of Health.
Bone marrow transplantation; diagnosis; classification
