Anxiety and depression in patients with acute leukaemia treated with hematopoietic stem cell transplantation

Acute leukemia and hospitalization for hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HCT) are the great psychological stressors. The aim of this study was to assess anxiety and depression associated with such conditions and their psychophysical predictors before and after HCT.

We conducted a longitudinal study using self-descriptive tools. The questionnaires: LOT-R, AIS, Mini-Mac, CECS, RSCL and HADS were filled by 60 patients with acute leukaemia before and after HCT.

Anxiety and depressive symptoms correlated positively with psychological symptom distress. The correlation with depressive symptoms was weak, however, with anxious symptoms was moderate. In both cases, the higher was a level of psychological symptom distress, the higher level of anxiety and depression was observed in patients. The results indicated the weak, positive correlation between onerousness of physical symptoms and a level of anxiety. The greater was the severity of physical symptoms, the higher was the level of anxiety. The negative predictor of anxious symptoms was control of anxiety but it was weakly associated with a lower level of the explained variable. The negative predictor of anxious symptoms was also dispositional optimism whose high level accompanied the lower severity of the explained variable. However, the positive predictor of anxious symptoms was the variable of onerousness of symptoms whose high level accompanied the higher severity of anxious symptoms in the examined group CONCLUSION: Patients with acute leukemia who are hospitalized for HCT require detailed monitoring of their psychological distress to introduce the proper psychological and pharmacological interventions that reduce anxiety as well as boost "dispositional optimism" and mechanisms of control.