Distress Screening Scores of Malignant and Benign Hematology Patients: Results of a Pilot Project.

Abstract 3173

The Cleveland Clinic Taussig Cancer Institute completed a pilot project on distress screening as part of the plan to address the American College of Surgeons Commission on Cancer requirement (Standard 3.2: Psychosocial Distress Screening) to screen malignant and benign hematology patients for distress and psychosocial health needs. Over a two week period every hematology patient seeing a physician or mid-level provider completed the distress screening instrument Emotions Thermometer (ET), a five dimensional tool that includes four predictor domains: distress, anxiety, depression, anger and one outcome domain of need for help. Each domain is rated on a 0 to 10 Likert type scale, in a thermometer format. With respect to validity and reliability, the sensitivity and specificity of the ET tool has been found comparable to known validity and reliability of other accepted measures of distress, depression, and anxiety (Mitchell, et al, 2009). Per National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) guidelines, a score of 4 or higher on distress screening warrants a referral to a psychosocial professional. Distress scores 4 and over were compared among the diagnoses using the Chi-Square test. When the overall P-value was significant (P <0.05), at least two groups differed, and pairwise comparisons were conducted to determine which diagnostic groups differed.

Of the five thermometer domains, patients scored highest on anxiety. There were no differences among diagnoses on anger (P=0.51), but there were differences in the other four domains (P<0.001 distress, depression, and need for help; P=0.026 anxiety). For all four, pairwise comparisons indicated that multiple myeloma patients had higher (worse) scores on anxiety, distress, depression, and need for help than all other diagnoses; there were no differences among benign hematology, leukemia/MDS/CML, or lymphoma/CLL.

While this pilot project does not answer why multiple myeloma patients report levels of psychosocial distress significantly higher than other hematology patients, increased attention needs to be given to address these patients' experience of anxiety, depression, and distress. This project provides valuable information about the levels of distress experienced among all hematology patients and is useful for determining staffing levels of psychosocial professionals needed to address distress.