A Single Center Survey of Distress Amongst Stem Cell Transplant Recipients
Authors: Fesler Mark J. , Weaver Crystal , McCormick Kimberly , Dwiggins Andrew 
Published: October 2019

Introduction:

According to the Commission on Cancer's 2012 program standards, patients diagnosed with cancer may experience psychological issues that can interfere with patient treatment plans and adversely affect outcomes. To address these issues, the Commission developed the following guidelines to accurately determine patient distress levels: 1) patients with cancer are offered screening for distress at least 1 time during a pivotal medical visit, 2) the mode of administration for the distress screening is to be determined by the program, and 3) facilities select the tool to be administered to screen for distress with preference being given to standardized, validated instruments.

To meet this standard and plan future work in distress reduction for stem cell transplant recipients, the St. Louis University Blood and Marrow Transplant Program began implementing The State Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI) with patients during pivotal medical visits. The STAI is a psychological inventory based on a 4-point Likert scale and consists of 40 questions on a self-report basis. The STAI differentiates between the temporary condition of "state anxiety" and the long-standing quality of "trait anxiety." The essential qualities evaluated by the STAI scale are feelings of apprehension, tension, nervousness, stress, and worry. Scores on the STAI scale increase in response to physical danger and psychological stress and decrease as a result of relaxation training. Average scores for working, male adults are 35.72 (state) and 34.89 (trait). Average scores for working, female adults are 35.20 (state) and 34.79 (trait). After implementing the STAI, it was realized that these screenings could be de-identified and analyzed in groups to determine if patterns emerged regarding patients' perceived anxiety levels throughout the bone marrow transplantation process.

Method:

The study team received Institutional Review Board approval to perform a retrospective examination of STAIs completed by patients throughout the bone marrow transplantation process at the St. Louis University Blood and Marrow Transplant Program from 03/11/2104 through 06/24/2014. A total of 30 inventories were collected, de-identified, and categorized by the following medical visits: arrival visit (the patient's first visit to the Blood and Marrow Transplant clinic), data review visit (the visit to review transplant related testing and sign consents), start of preparative regimen visit, day 0 visit, day +30 bone marrow biopsy visit for allogenic transplantation, day +30 bone marrow biopsy result visit for allogenic transplantation, and day +100 visit for auto transplantation. Averages for each medical visit category were determined by finding the mean score. Category averages were then compared to determine if a particular pivotal medical visit caused patients to experience an overall increase in anxiety level.

Results:

Results from the study indicate that patients experience the highest levels of anxiety during the early medical visits of the bone marrow transplantation process. Average state anxiety scores were 46 during the arrival visits, 41 during the data review visits, and 44 during the start of preparative regimen visits. Average trait anxiety scores were 38 during the arrival visits, 45 during the data review visits, and 39 during the start of preparative regimen visits. During the day 0 visits, patients' state anxiety scores decreased to an average of 36 and trait anxiety scores decreased to an average of 35. Day +30 and day +100 visits demonstrated even further decreases in state and trait anxiety scores.

Conclusion:

The surprising finding of this study was that patients demonstrated a higher level of distress in the period leading up to the transplant which gradually decreased once the preparative regimen was administered. The sample size for this study was small and could possibly skew results. However, this study does provide a starting basis for future study in bone marrow transplant recipient distress, and larger, multi-site studies are being planned to ensure the accuracy of the patterns, which emerged from this study. If patterns could be accurately identified and predicted, the study team may also be able to develop future studies to primitively lower patients' anxiety levels early in the bone marrow transplantation process and thus improve outcomes.

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Disclosures

No relevant conflicts of interest to declare.