The paper examined anxiety and depression in hospitalized patients and gave 30 cancer patients daily then every‑other‑day injections of thymosin‑alpha‑1, checking immune cells and quality of life, but it did not provide clear evidence that the peptide improves mood or overall health for non‑clinical use.

To assess the co-morbidity of anxiety and depression in hospitalized patients and to analyze the degree of symptoms and the influential factors. Thirty patients with malignant tumor were injected with thymosin alpha 1 subcutaneously at the dose of 1.6 mg q.d. for the first month and q.o.d. for the following month. The number of T cell subgroups and the activity of NK cell in peripheral blood were detected and the quality of life of the patients were evaluated before treatment and at the end of treatment. (1) About 39.9 % of the patients presented the symptoms of anxiety and depression and out of them 6.7 % were taken psychotropic medication. (2) Stepwise Logistic Regression showed that the factors related to anxiety and depression could be classified into four categories: economic factor, sleeping status, cognition of disease, the other factors such as course of disease and the environment of hospital. (3) Data analysis of oncology patients showed that the cognition of disease would be an important factor, which would affect anxiety and depression status. Multiple factors can affect anxiety and depression symptoms of inpatients. The results suggest that psychological intervention such as cognitive therapy should be considered in clinical practice.