Psychosocial aspects of haematopoietic stem cell donation for allogeneic transplantation: How family donors cope with this experience

Peripheral blood stem cell (PBSC) allogeneic transplantation is an innovati ve medical procedure which has many advantages in comparison with bone marr ow (BM) transplantation, but it involves administering haematopoietic growt h factors (HGFs) to donors, the long-term physiological effects of which ha ve not yet been established. The main aim of the present study was to analy se how family PBSC donors cope when confronted with this particular risk co ntext. In addition to data collected on the personal and social aspects of the donors' experience, questionnaires were used to measure their quality o f life (pain and anxiety) before, during and after donation, and they were subsequently interviewed in depth by a psychologist. Twenty-two donors part icipated in this study. They did not all react to the experience of blood c ell donation in the same way, in terms of their own personal feelings, atti tudes towards the donation, their relationships with the other members of t he family, and their awareness of the risks involved. Copyright (C) 1999 Jo hn Wiley & Sons, Ltd.