Trial reportHealth psychology : official journal of the Division of Health Psychology, American Psychological Association2025
Effects of expressive helping writing during stem cell transplant: Randomized controlled trial.
Trial report in Health psychology : official journal of the Division of Health Psychology, American Psychological Association, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
1 citing paper in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Supportive care interventions in hematopoietic stem cell transplantation: a systematic review and meta-analysis.Blood advances · 2026Pooled it
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
9 authors.
Funding
Abstract
objectiveMost cancer patients undergoing hematopoietic stem cell transplant report elevated symptoms and reduced health-related quality of life during peritransplant. These concerns can become persistent. A prior randomized controlled trial showed that expressive helping-a low-burden, brief intervention combining expressive writing with a novel peer support writing exercise-reduced psychological distress and physical symptoms in long-term transplant survivors with moderate/high persistent symptoms. The Writing for Insight, Strength, and Ease trial evaluated the use of expressive helping during peritransplant, when symptoms peak and early intervention could prevent the development of persistent symptoms.
methodThree hundred sixty-six adult blood cancer patients (44.3% female, 74.6% White, 13.4% Black, 11.5% Hispanic/Latinx) scheduled for allogeneic (33.9%) or autologous (66.1%) transplant were randomized to complete either expressive helping or a neutral writing task in four writing sessions beginning pretransplant and ending 4 weeks posthospital discharge. Symptom severity (primary outcome), distress (depressive symptoms, generalized and cancer-specific anxiety), health-related quality of life, and fatigue were measured in multiple assessments from prerandomization to 12 months postintervention. Primary endpoints at 3 and 12 months postintervention estimated short- and long-term intervention effects. Moderation analyses explored subgroup differences in intervention efficacy.
resultsMixed models with repeated measures analyses revealed no statistically or clinically significant intervention effects on primary or secondary outcomes. Moderation analyses did not identify subgroups of participants who benefitted from the intervention.
conclusionFindings do not support use of expressive helping during peritransplant. We recommend that survivors with persistent symptoms complete expressive helping at least 9 months posttransplant, consistent with evidence from a prior trial. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).
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