Social Relationships and Accelerated Aging in Hematopoietic Cell Transplant Survivors

PRIMARY OBJECTIVES:

I. Examine associations between social support, strain, and isolation and phenotypic aging over the 1-year recovery period.

II. Examine associations between social support, strain, and isolation and biological aging over the 1-year recovery period.

III. Test biological aging as a mediator linking social processes and phenotypic aging.

EXPLORATORY OBJECTIVE:

I. Test sex differences in Aims 1 and 2.

OUTLINE:

Adopting a prospective design, participants will complete comprehensive assessments of social processes at 100 days and 1 year after HCT that combine reports of social support, strain, and isolation with a naturalistic observation tool, the Electronically Activated Recorder (EAR), which captures ambient sound bites to assess social interactions in survivors' daily lives16. At each time point, participants will also provide reports of symptoms to characterize phenotypic aging, including cognitive, physical, and functional complaints, and blood samples to assess biological aging, including cellular senescence, DNA damage, SASP, and cellular stress using genome-wide RNA sequencing. Relevant clinical information that could influence biological aging will also be collected from patients' medical records to consider as covariates.

Inclusion criteria

• Aged 18 years and older who are competent to give their informed consent.
• Ability to read, speak, and understand English.
• Received a hematopoietic cell transplant within the previous 100 days.

Exclusion criteria

• Less then Aged 18 years and older who are competent to give their informed consent.
• Cannot read, speak, and understand English.
• Has not received a hematopoietic cell transplant within the previous 100 days.