1. D A N I E L R Ă D U Ț Ă
R O M A N I A N A S S O C I A T I O N A G A I N S T
L E U K E M I A
Center of Excellence for treatment
of hematologic diseases

2. Briefly
 Center of Excellence at Bucharest University
Hospital
 Treatment of hematological diseases
 One of the most renowned European centers offers
the know-how
 San Raffaele Hospital, Milano, Italy
 ARIL (Romanian Association against Leukemia) supports the
project

3. Summary
 Hematological diseases and their treatment in Romania
 Through the story of a leukemia patient: me
 The need for improving Romanian conditions
 Expressed in facts and numbers
 Our proposal
 The project
 People and expertise

4. What is a hematological disease
 Hematological diseases affect the bone marrow and
blood
 There are chronic and acute forms
 Leukemia and lymphoma account for 90%
 I was diagnosed with Acute Leukemia in 2009
 Left untreated, acute forms kill you in a few weeks
 Some say is a death sentence
 I’m the living proof of the contrary

5. The treatment
 Two major therapies
 Chemotherapy (full cycle)
 Bone marrow transplantation (BMT), preceded by initial chemotherapy
 Acute forms are the most difficult to treat
 Aggressive chemotherapy that weakens the patients immunity and
organism
 One needs proper sterile facilities to avoid (often fatal) complication
 BMT is required in many of such cases
 I was treated in one of the best facilities in Romania
 However, the sterile conditions are still lower than the standards
 As a result, many patient suffer fatal complications
 Lucky me …

6. Bone marrow transplantation
 BMT is increasingly preferred as the best solution
 My form of leukemia required a BMT
 Only two types of transplant are performed in Romania
 Autologous (using one self's healthy cells)
 Matched Related Donor (MRD): uses stem cells from a fully
compatible brother or sister
 I needed one of the others
 Partially Matched Related Donor
 Matched Unrelated Donor (MUD)
 With stem cells from Cord Blood

7. BMT in this cases
 In another EU country at a cost of at least 120.000€
 As a Romanian, you have two choices
 Pay the money from your own pocket
 Access special government funds
 A fund raising campaign got me the money in 2 months
 The government procedure can take as long as 12 months
 While waiting, a patient receives further aggressive chemotherapy
 Again I was lucky!

8. A few other patients who did not find cure in Romania
People you see here are some that appeared in mass-media and some we had time to request their explicit agreement

9. Situation in
Romania
European Cancer
Observatory estimated
3265 people
were diagnosed with
leukemia or lymphoma
in 2008
At most 140 BMT
were performed in
2009,
according to the Romanian
official press releases
1560
1705
Leukemia Lymphoma
Sources: European Cancer Observatory ( http://eu-cancer.iarc.fr ) , Romanian Newspapers and Journals
4%
96%
Therapy
BMT Only chemotherapy

10. Situation in
Europe
A study of EBMT shows
that most European
countries perform
at least 200 BMT
per 10 million inhabitants
with many of them
performing
at least 400 BMT
per 10 million inhabitants
EBMT (European Group for
Blood and Marrow
Transplantation) study can be
found here
HSCT stands for Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation which is just another name for BMT

11. Comparison
Incidence of leukemia
and lymphoma does not
vary significantly from
year to year
BMT procedures in
Europe increased each
year
So we may perform a
fairly accurate
comparison between
Romania and EU for
2009
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
400
BMT per 10 million
Romania
Western EU
Central EU

12. How many
would have a
better chance
If Romania reaches at
least Central Europe’s
minimum BMT rate,
260 more patients
would be transplanted
each year, thus having a
much better chance for
long-term survival
4%
96%
Actual
BMT Full chemotherapy
12%
88%
Desired
BMT Full Chemotherapy

13. Our proposal
 Center of Excellence at Bucharest University Hospital (SUUB)
 People involved
 The team from San Raffaele Hospital in Milan, lead by dr. Fabio Ciceri
 The team from SUUB lead by dr. Horia Bumbea and dr. Ana
Vlădăreanu
 Competencies
 Italian team agreed to transfer the expertise and competencies the
Romanian team does not yet poses
 Facility
 Equipping a brand-new transplant facility
 Improving the existing hematological facility
 Updating the diagnostic laboratory with the latest technology

14. HSR, the key partner
 Who is HSR
 Bone Marrow Transplantation Unit at San Raffale Hospital, Milano,
Italy
 Participants in this project include dr. Fabio Ciceri, dr. Jacopo
Peccatori, dr. Andrea Assanelli, cs. Vincenzo Matozzo
 They will offer intensive training and supervision to
professionals at SUUB
 They evaluated three potential partners in Romania
 They chose SUUB team as the most promising one
 The collaboration is ready to take off
 Training plan is made, resources and costs estimated
More about HSR on their website: http://www.fondazionesanraffaele.it/EN_home/index.html

15. More about HSR
 BMT Unit is considered one of the best in Europe
 Recognized by the community as having very good research
activity
 One of the few centers in Europe who successfully perform
PMRD transplants on a large scale
 Comparison to Romanian centers
 HSR performed more transplants than all our centers
 HSR performs all 5 types of transplant, compared to only 2

16. Project goal & objectives
 The Goal
 Improve the treatment conditions in Romania and consequently save
more patients
 Perform PMRD transplants in Romania
 Main Objectives
 30 transplants in the 2nd year of functioning
 The first PMRD transplant in Romania in the 2nd year
 Secondary Objectives
 Build up transplant expertise at SUUB and also in the Romanian
medical community
 Expand the transplant center in the following years

17. Project activities
Management
Communication
plan
Monitoring &
controlling
Planning &
estimations
People &
Responsibilities
Medical training
Facility costs
Other costs
Project
documentation
Obtaining
funds
Applying for
Swiss funds
Applying for EU
programs
Donations and
sponsors
Medical
training
Training at HSR
Interventions at
HSR
Supervised
activity at SUUB
Assisted activity
at SUUB
Facility
equipment
Acquisition
process
Implementation
Communication
& PR
Project Website
& Blog
Online Media
Traditional
Media
Presentations
and networking

18. Project
estimated
costs
Facility costs
Staff training
Interventions costs
Other costs
Interventions costs
would be supported by
the Romanian Public
Assurance
For the rest, we must
find solutions
Facility
50%
Training
4%
Interventio
ns
40%
Other
6%
5.000.000 €

19. Project team
 The backbone consists of the two great medical teams
 A very promising medical team at SUUB
 One of Europe’s most renowned medical teams as mentors
 Supporting team
 Full-time involvement of ARIL’s president, Monica Bunaciu,
formerly diagnosed with leukemia
 Daniel Răduță, formerly diagnosed with leukemia, Project Manager
at BitDefender
 Adina Ovedenie, ARIL volunteer, expert in European funds
 Diana Stoleru, ARIL volunteer, Chanel Manager at BitDefender
 Ruxandra Predescu, ARIL volunteer, PR specialist

20. Thank you
Daniel Răduță
Romanian Association Against Leukemia (ARIL)
draduta@gmail.com
draduta