OBJECTIVES:~Primary~Determine the efficacy of tacrolimus and mycophenolate mofetil in preventing acute graft-vs-host disease in patients with advanced hematologic malignancies undergoing allogeneic peripheral blood stem cell transplantation.~Secondary~Determine the safety of this regimen in these patients.~OUTLINE: This is a non-randomized study.~Patients receive tacrolimus IV continuously or orally twice daily on days -1 to 60 followed by a taper to day 180. Patients also receive mycophenolate mofetil IV over 2 hours or orally twice daily on days 0-60 followed by a taper to day 180. Treatment is discontinued at day 180 in the absence of graft-vs-host disease.~Patients are followed for survival.~PROJECTED ACCRUAL: A total of 5-25 patients will be accrued for this study.
RATIONALE: Tacrolimus and mycophenolate mofetil may be an effective treatment for graft-versus-host disease caused by donor stem cell transplantation.~PURPOSE: This phase II trial is studying how well giving tacrolimus together with mycophenolate mofetil works in preventing acute graft-versus-host disease in patients who are undergoing donor stem cell transplantation for advanced hematologic cancer.