Combined chelation therapy with deferiprone and desferrioxamine in iron overloaded beta-thalassemia patients.

Dear Editor-in-Chief, We shortly report our results of combined iron chelation therapy with deferiprone (DFP) and desferrioxamine (DFX) versus chelation therapy with DFP alone, in iron overloaded β-thalassemia patients. Desferrioxamine has been a life saving iron chelator for thousands of patients in the last 40 years. However, less than 10% of the patients requiring iron chelation therapy worldwide are able to receive DFX because of it’s high cost and many of them, especially teenagers, find difficulty in complying with daily subcoutaneous administration. The only clinically available oral iron chelator is deferiprone (1,2-dimethyl-3-hydroxy-pyrid-4-one), which has so far been taken by over 6000 patients worldwide with very promising results. The purpose of this study was to test the efficacy and safety of DFP alone or in combination with DFX for the treatment of secondary haemosiderosis in patients with β-thalassemia.