Hollings celebrates new dedicated outpatient bone marrow transplant clinic

It all started with a 17-year-old patient.

Let’s say her name was Mary.

Mary was diagnosed with chronic myeloid leukemia and received a bone marrow transplant (BMT) from an unrelated donor who was matched to her through the National Marrow Donor Program.

“It was smooth, uneventful and ultimately completely successful,” recalled Robert Stuart, M.D., who built the oncology program at the Medical University of South Carolina that eventually became MUSC Hollings Cancer Center and retired in 2021.

This approach wasn’t unusual for 1996. What was unusual was that Stuart decided to do the procedure on an outpatient basis.

“She had attentive parents, and she was really never sick enough to warrant hospitalization,” he explained.

Unbeknownst to Stuart – or to Mary or her parents – Stuart and his patient had just become trailblazers with the world’s first outpatient matched unrelated transplant, according to the National Marrow Donor Program. And in the publicity that followed the program’s announcement of this first, more cancer centers began to offer outpatient transplants.

“I am extremely honored to have my name associated with this clinic, but even more, I'm pleased beyond words that future patients will be supported in this way.”

Robert Stuart, M.D.

Doctors began to see that for patients who were diagnosed at an early stage and were relatively healthy, an outpatient procedure offered a lot of benefits. Patients stayed healthier and stronger. Their quality of life was better as they recovered at home with family. They experienced fewer side effects and avoided the possibility of picking up an infection in the hospital.

Outpatient procedures became more common. At Hollings, half of autologous transplants, or transplants using the patient’s own cells, are performed on an outpatient basis. With the need growing – the number of adult patients transplanted at MUSC increased by more than 50% from 2018 to 2023 – a larger, dedicated outpatient bone marrow transplant space was called for.

And on Aug. 2, MUSC leaders, former patients, donors and the blood cancers team gathered to celebrate the ribbon cutting of the new outpatient Robert K. Stuart, M.D., Blood and Marrow Transplant Center in Ashley River Tower on MUSC’s peninsular Charleston campus.

“So more than 25 years after the world's first outpatient unrelated donor bone marrow stem cell transplant, we finally have this beautiful, functional, modern outpatient clinic that will expand and refine what to me is a noble effort,” Stuart told the assembled crowd. “I am extremely honored to have my name associated with this clinic, but even more, I'm pleased beyond words that future patients will be supported in this way.”

He especially thanked two groups of attendees: former patients and family members of patients who had died. He noted that family members sometimes stay in touch and thank him, even after a patient dies, a generosity of spirit that he called “the ultimate in humanity.”

“I just want you to know how much that has meant to me over the years,” he said. “And it has sustained me in some very dark times.”

 

The new outpatient clinic includes 16 infusion chairs, including an open day room; semi-private rooms; private rooms for patients with low white blood cells, which makes it harder for them to fight infections; a blood draw area so that patients can get lab work done on-site; and two negative pressure rooms to care for patients with an airborne illness.

Michelle Hudspeth, M.D., director of adult and pediatric blood and marrow transplantation, said that the program has experienced unbelievable growth and unimaginable challenges since 2019.

She highlighted the many team members – nurse navigators, patient care assistants, quality and data analysts, business coordinator, pharmacists, physician assistants, nurse practitioners and physicians – who she said work together every day to build upon Stuart’s legacy.

“This team that's here with me today has made it happen,” she said. “And why is that? Because we recognize that every patient who comes to us is somebody’s everything.”

Raymond N. DuBois, M.D., Ph.D., director of Hollings Cancer Center, noted that the design of the new clinic included input from a variety of perspectives, including patients, doctors and nurses.

 

The Blood and Marrow Transplant Program is the only FACT-accredited combined adult and pediatric BMT program in South Carolina, and the program has performed more than 3,000 transplants, DuBois said.

He thanked Stuart, who he called a true pioneer, for his work to build the program from scratch.

And David Cole, M.D., president of MUSC, lauded Stuart, explaining that when Stuart arrived in 1985, he was the first board-certified oncologist at MUSC – a time when the cancer center didn’t even exist.

“Stuart had lofty goals, including the creation of a training program for future oncologists, improving treatments for the people and citizens of South Carolina and launching a bone marrow stem cell transplant program,” Cole said. “He succeeded in all three and became a lifelong advocate for patients.”

“The term hero is becoming too commonplace, which is a bit unfortunate, especially when we have so many unsung heroes who deserve to be elevated and recognized for their amazing work,” Cole continued. “So many of these people are standing among us today. But I would highlight one hero, and that would be Dr. Robert K Stuart.”

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