Multiple myeloma is a form of a cancer which results because of malignant plasma cells. Multiple myeloma treatment often involves administration of chemotherapy treatment. However, one of the major side effects of chemotherapy in this case is that it ends up destroying the healthy blood forming cells as well.

Therefore, high dose chemotherapy is often followed up by the transplantation of healthy bone marrow cells, which can be derived from the body of the patient itself. This procedure is, thus, known as autologous stem cell transplantation.

The stem cells used for autologous transplantation are derived before delivering high dose chemotherapy to the patient. The same stem cells are injected back again to the body of the patient.