In patients newly diagnosed with lymphoma or multiple myeloma, depressive symptoms were found to be common and also linked with early death, stated a Psycho-Oncology study. The study included 255 patients, of whom 83 had depression. Over a median follow-up of approximately 3.5 years, 61 patients died. These included 30 patients in the "never depression" group, 6 patients in the "new-onset" group, 16 patients in the "remission" group, and 9 patients in the "persistent" group. These groups were based on depressive symptoms assessed before starting cancer treatment and one month later.
‘Shorter survival was observed in both blood cancer patients who remained depressed and patients who recovered from depressive symptoms.
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The risk of death was 3-times and 2-times higher in the "remission" and "persistent" groups, respectively, than in the "never depression" group; however, risk of death was not significantly greater in the "new-onset" group compared with the "never depression" group.
Source-Eurekalert