Review of Multistate Models in Hematopoietic Cell Transplantation Studies

Patients experience a number of complications after hematopoietic cell transplantation (HCT), including failure to recover neutrophil or platelet counts, acute or chronic graft-versus-host disease (GVHD), and disease relapse. Such complications, as well as other factors, may lead to death. Accurate modeling of the likelihood of these complications can provide insight into the recovery process after HCT and guide clinical monitoring. Multistate models are a useful tool for describing the posttransplantation recovery process.