High-Dose Chemotherapy Plus Autologous Stem Cell Transplantation Compared With Intermediate-Dose Chemotherapy Plus Autologous Stem Cell Transplantation With or Without Isotretinoin in Treating Young Patients With Recurrent High-Grade Gliomas

OBJECTIVES: * Compare the event-free survival and overall survival of pediatric patients with recurrent high-grade gliomas treated with a single course of high-dose carboplatin, etoposide, and thiotepa and autologous stem cell transplantation vs multiple courses of intermediate-dose carboplatin and thiotepa and autologous stem cell transplantation with or without isotretinoin. * Compare the number of hospital days and time to engraftment in patients treated with these regimens. * Compare the toxic death rate in patients treated with these regimens. * Compare the tolerability of isotretinoin in patients treated with these regimens. OUTLINE: This is a randomized, multicenter study. Patients are stratified according to pathologic diagnosis (glioblastoma multiforme vs anaplastic astrocytoma vs other high-grade glioma). * Chemotherapy and autologous stem cell reinfusion (ASCR): Patients are randomized to 1 of 2 treatment arms. * Arm I (high-dose chemotherapy and ASCR): Patients receive high-dose chemotherapy comprising carboplatin IV over 4 hours on days -8 to -6; thiotepa IV over 3 hours and etoposide IV over 3 hours on days -5 to -3; and filgrastim (G-CSF) IV or subcutaneously (SC) once daily beginning on day 1 and continuing until blood counts recover. Autologous peripheral blood stem cells (PBSC) or bone marrow are reinfused on day 0. * Arm II (intermediate-dose chemotherapy and ASCR): Patients receive intermediate-dose chemotherapy comprising carboplatin IV over 4 hours and thiotepa IV over 3 hours on days 1-2 and G-CSF IV or SC once daily beginning on day 4 and continuing until blood counts recover. Autologous PBSC or bone marrow are reinfused on day 3. Treatment repeats every 28 days for a total of 3 courses. * Maintenance therapy: After recovery from chemotherapy (approximately day 30 post-transplantation), all patients are further randomized to 1 of 2 maintenance arms. * Arm I: Patients receive oral isotretinoin twice daily on days 1-14. Treatment repeats every 28 days for a total of 6 courses. * Arm II: Patients do not receive maintenance therapy. In all arms, treatment continues in the absence of disease progression. Patients are followed every 3 months for 1 year, every 6 months for 3 years, and then annually thereafter. PROJECTED ACCRUAL: A total of 80-150 patients (40-75 per treatment arm) will be accrued for this study within 5 years.