Caregiver Sleep and Patient Neutrophil Engraftment in Allogeneic Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplant: A Secondary Analysis.

This was a secondary exploratory analysis, not a randomised test of improving caregiver sleep, so it cannot show that caregiver sleep caused shorter engraftment. Patient sleep and many patient medical variables were not collected, so patient factors could explain the relationship. Caregiver sleep was assessed for only three days, not the longer period recommended in the paper. The analysis used baseline data from a caregiver intervention trial, and the final sample was 124 dyads after exclusions. Caregivers and patients were primarily Caucasian, which limits how broadly the result applies.

The authors reported no funding or conflicts of interest.

Do not conclude that treating caregiver sleep will reduce patient time to neutrophil engraftment. This was a secondary analysis of associations in 124 dyads, not a randomised test of a sleep intervention, and patient sleep was not measured.