Jada Bascom Foundation
All conditions

Myeloproliferative neoplasms

Primary myelofibrosis

Also called: PMF · MF · CIMF (historical) · myelofibrosis · bone marrow scarring · myeloproliferative neoplasm · MPN · Chronic idiopathic myelofibrosis

What a donor has to do with this

For some people with this condition, a transplant using blood stem cells from an unrelated donor is part of the treatment guidelines. When a transplant is the right route and no one in the family matches, that donor comes from a registry. Not everyone with this condition has a transplant, and many never need one.

This is our reading of published transplant guidelines for this condition, not a measurement of how many people need a donor. Where a source actually counted donors, the figure and the people it counted are shown further down. Where none did, we say so rather than estimate.

What the evidence says

Who it affects
Typically diagnosed after age 65 and is markedly more common in men. Source population/region/year: primary-myelofibrosis studies from Europe, North America, Asia and Australia/New Zealand synthesized in a Frontiers in Oncology review published 2024.
Treatments other than a transplant
JAK inhibitors (including ruxolitinib) and symptom-directed therapy; these can reduce spleen/symptom burden and bridge to HCT but are not established curative substitutes
If a transplant is used, the cells come from
Allogeneic peripheral blood or bone marrow; matched unrelated and alternative donors used when no matched sibling exists; cord-blood use was not reported in the opened disease-specific sources; dominant source not reported in the opened disease-specific sources
How often the donor was unrelated
Not reported. No source we could read states this for this condition, so we do not give a number. An estimate here would be a guess dressed as evidence.

Where this gets complicated

Primary MF must be distinguished from post-polycythaemia-vera and post-essential-thrombocythaemia MF; transplant studies often pool these fibrotic MPNs.

Written for transplant clinicians, not for patients. We quote it so you can see what the guidance actually says:
“Primary or post-ET/PV myelofibrosis can only be cured by allo-HCT”

It describes what teams consider in general. It cannot say what applies to any one person. Read the source.

People with this condition need donors

Joining a registry is a cheek swab and a short health form. You are contacted only if you turn out to be a possible match for someone, and you can ask questions and decline before anything else happens.

Find your registry

Related conditions

Others in myeloproliferative neoplasms. They are genuinely different diseases with different treatments — the group name is not a diagnosis.

Where this came from