Photo Credit: Klebercordeiro
A mobile app offering treatment and self-care information reduced nausea and vomiting in patients who underwent stem cell transplantation for leukemia.
Self-care education via a smartphone app significantly improved the severity of nausea and vomiting up to three months after stem cell transplantation (SCT) in patients with leukemia, according to study results published in Hematology, Transfusion and Cell Therapy.
“Therefore, this method is recommended to reduce the severity of nausea and vomiting in patients with leukemia who undergo transplantation,” wrote corresponding author Zakerimoghadam Masoumeh, PhD, and study coauthors.
The research team developed the app used in the study. The app included information on leukemia and treatments, adverse effects, and self-care for patients. Post-transplant nutrition, infection control, symptom relief, and oral hygiene were specifically addressed, as well as visitation with others during the recovery period.
Researchers tested the app’s effect on 104 patients with leukemia undergoing SCT at Shariati Hospital in Tehran in 2019 and 2020. The researchers randomly assigned patients to either an intervention or control group. The former received the educational app and routine care, while the latter received routine care alone. Routine care included a group education session with a lecture before transplantation began.
“A noteworthy point is that patients are discharged from hospitals after the SCT procedure and a 1-month hospitalization process,” researchers wrote. “After discharge, patients need to be isolated at home for up to three months, during which time the patients and their caregivers are responsible for monitoring and managing side effects of their treatment.”
The researchers evaluated the severity of nausea and vomiting at 2 weeks, 1 month, and 3 months after transplantation via the visual analog scale and the Khavar oncology scale.
Both nausea and vomiting significantly differed between the intervention and control groups at all three timepoints, according to the study. The severity and frequency of vomiting episodes were much lower in the intervention group than in the control group.
“Since vomiting is a common post-transplantation problem that makes eating and drinking difficult for patients, this type of self-care education is recommended to reduce post-transplantation complications and problems for these patients,” researchers wrote.
