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Málaga hospital is now the second busiest in Spain for bone marrow transplants
The Regional University Hospital performed 98 allogeneic transplants in 2025 and has become the national leader for procedures using unrelated donors
When we talk about medical breakthroughs, it's easy to think in terms of dramatic announcements or new wonder drugs. But sometimes the most meaningful progress happens quietly, in specialist units where teams refine techniques year by year until they're genuinely changing what's possible for patients. That's exactly what's been happening in Málaga.The Regional University Hospital of Málaga performed 98 allogeneic bone marrow transplants in 2025, making it the leading centre in Andalucía and the second busiest in the whole of Spain for this procedure. It has also become the national leader in transplants carried out using unrelated donors, a particularly significant achievement given how complex those cases tend to be.
Bone marrow transplantation, more precisely called hematopoietic stem cell transplantation, is used to treat serious blood and lymphatic system conditions including various forms of leukaemia, lymphoma and aplastic anaemia. The procedure replaces a patient's diseased blood cells with healthy ones from a compatible donor, effectively rebuilding the immune system from scratch. It's a complex process, but one that has become considerably more accessible in Málaga thanks to a key technical advance.
The hospital has implemented a new approach to preventing graft-versus-host disease, one of the most serious complications that can arise after a transplant. The technique allows donors with only partial immunological compatibility to be used without reducing the chances of a successful outcome. In practical terms, that means more patients can now find a suitable donor who previously would have struggled.
María Jesús Pascual, head of the Hematopoietic Transplant Section, explained what that means in practice. "The incorporation of this prophylaxis has meant a very important change because it allows us to offer a transplant to patients who previously had much more difficulty finding a suitable donor, while maintaining results comparable to those obtained with fully compatible donors," she said.
Nearly half of the 98 transplants carried out in 2025 used donors with HLA 9/10 compatibility rather than a perfect match, which is especially valuable when time is short or no fully compatible donor exists.
Manuel Isidro Muñoz, head of Haematology and Haemotherapy, summed up the broader picture. "Each advance we incorporate means that more patients can find a donor and access curative treatment when it was not possible before."
Image: Junta de Andalucía
