scholarly journals Use of Mobile Devices to Help Cancer Patients Meet Their Information Needs in Non-Inpatient Settings: Systematic Review (Preprint)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Richards ◽  
Paul Kinnersley ◽  
Kate Brain ◽  
Grace McCutchan ◽  
John Staffurth ◽  
...  

BACKGROUND The shift from inpatient to outpatient cancer care means that patients are now required to manage their condition at home, away from regular supervision by clinicians. Subsequently, research has consistently reported that many patients with cancer have unmet information needs during their illness. Mobile devices, such as mobile phones and tablet computers, provide an opportunity to deliver information to patients remotely. To date, no systematic reviews have evaluated how mobile devices have been used specifically to help patients meet to their information needs. OBJECTIVE A systematic review was conducted to identify studies that describe the use of mobile interventions to enable patients with cancer meet their cancer-related information needs in non-inpatient settings, and to describe the effects and feasibility of these interventions. METHODS MEDLINE, Embase, and PsycINFO databases were searched up until January 2017. Search terms related to “mobile devices,” “information needs,” and “cancer” were used. There were no restrictions on study type in order to be as inclusive as possible. Study participants were patients with cancer undergoing treatment. Interventions had to be delivered by a mobile or handheld device, attempt to meet patients’ cancer-related information needs, and be for use in non-inpatient settings. Critical Appraisal Skills Programme checklists were used to assess the methodological quality of included studies. A narrative synthesis was performed and findings were organized by common themes found across studies. RESULTS The initial search yielded 1020 results. We included 23 articles describing 20 studies. Interventions aimed to improve the monitoring and management of treatment-related symptoms (17/20, 85%), directly increase patients’ knowledge related to their condition (2/20, 10%), and improve communication of symptoms to clinicians in consultations (1/20, 5%). Studies focused on adult (17/20; age range 24-87 years) and adolescent (3/20; age range 8-18 years) patients. Sample sizes ranged from 4-125, with 13 studies having 25 participants or fewer. Most studies were conducted in the United Kingdom (12/20, 52%) or United States (7/20, 30%). Of the 23 articles included, 12 were of medium quality, 9 of poor quality, and 2 of good quality. Overall, interventions were reported to be acceptable and perceived as useful and easy to use. Few technical problems were encountered. Adherence was generally consistent and high (periods ranged from 5 days to 6 months). However, there was considerable variation in use of intervention components within and between studies. Reported benefits of the interventions included improved symptom management, patient empowerment, and improved clinician-patient communication, although mixed findings were reported for patients’ health-related quality of life and anxiety. CONCLUSIONS The current review highlighted that mobile interventions for patients with cancer are only meeting treatment or symptom-related information needs. There were no interventions designed to meet patients’ full range of cancer-related information needs, from information on psychological support to how to manage finances during cancer, and the long-term effects of treatment. More comprehensive interventions are required for patients to meet their information needs when managing their condition in non-inpatient settings. Controlled evaluations are needed to further determine the effectiveness of these types of intervention.

10.2196/10026 ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 6 (12) ◽  
pp. e10026 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Richards ◽  
Paul Kinnersley ◽  
Kate Brain ◽  
Grace McCutchan ◽  
John Staffurth ◽  
...  

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Richards ◽  
Paul Kinnersley ◽  
Kate Brain ◽  
John Staffurth ◽  
Fiona Wood

BACKGROUND The shift from inpatient to outpatient and community cancer care means that more patients with cancer are required to manage their condition at home, without the direct supervision of their clinician. Subsequently, research has reported that many patients with cancer have unmet information needs during their illness. Mobile devices, such as mobile phones and tablet computers, provide an opportunity to deliver information to patients remotely. We aimed to develop an app intervention to help patients to meet their illness-related information needs in non-inpatient settings. In-depth qualitative research was required in order to gain an understanding of the views of the target users prior to design of the intervention. OBJECTIVE This study aimed to explore the information needs of patients with cancer and their preferences for an app and desired app features. Specifically, the perceived acceptability of an app, desired app features and the potential benefits and disadvantages of, and barriers to, an app were explored. METHODS Qualitative, one-to-one semi-structured interviews were conducted with patients with urological, colorectal, breast or gynecological cancers (n=23) across two hospitals in South Wales. Interviews were audio-taped, transcribed and analyzed using thematic analysis. RESULTS Findings indicated that barriers to information exchange and understanding in consultations, and identification of reliable information sources between consultations, appeared to contribute to patients’ unmet information needs. Consequently, app feature suggestions included a question prompt list, glossary of cancer terms, resources feature and a contacts feature. Anticipated benefits of this type of app included a more informed patient, improved quality of life, decreased anxiety and increased confidence to participate in their care. The anticipated barriers to app use are likely to be temporary or can be minimized with consideration of these findings during app development and implementation. CONCLUSIONS This study highlights cancer patients’ desire for an app intervention to help them to meet their information needs during and between consultations with their clinicians. This study also highlights the anticipated acceptability and benefits of this type of intervention, however further research is warranted.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hong Liu ◽  
Yifeng Ren ◽  
Yuting Wang ◽  
Yu Yang ◽  
Chuan Zheng ◽  
...  

Abstract BackgroundUpper gastrointestinal syndrome including nausea, vomiting, and anorexia is a common side effect of chemotherapy, which are associated with treatment interruptions, reduced food intake, decreased functionality and a worse quality of life. Rikkunshito is a traditional herbal medicine that has gained increasing attention in recent years for its effect on relieving gastrointestinal disorders in various digestive diseases, while its efficacy for upper gastrointestinal syndrome induced by chemotherapy remains uncertain. MethodsDatabases including PubMed, EMBASE, MEDLINE, Cochrane Library, Chinese databases, and Japanese database will be systematically searched from their inception onwards. Randomized controlled trials will be assessed. The primary outcome parameters are the complete control (CC) rate, complete response (CR) rate, and complete protection (CP) rate in the overall phase (0–120 hours). The secondary outcomes include: (I) the CC rate, CR rate and CP rate during the acute phase (0–24 hours) and delayed phase (24–120 hours); (II) the score and frequency of vomiting, nausea, and anorexia occurring; (III) the daily dietary intake and body weight; (IV) plasma ghrelin level; (V) quality of life; (VI) incidence of adverse events. The overall quality of the data will be assessed using the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development and Evaluation guidelines. Risk of bias will be evaluated by the Cochrane tool. Reporting bias will be estimated using Begg and Egger tests. Heterogeneity will be evaluated by the I2 statistic and Q test. If I2 > 50%, sensitivity analysis and subgroup analysis of different items will be performed. DiscussionFrom the study, we will ascertain the efficacy and safety of rikkunshito in chemotherapy-induced upper gastrointestinal syndrome. This review may provide evidence for rikkunshito as an adjuvant to treat upper gastrointestinal symptoms in patients with cancer. Systematic review registrationCRD42020214299 in PROSPERO.


10.2196/14187 ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (7) ◽  
pp. e14187 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Richards ◽  
Paul Kinnersley ◽  
Kate Brain ◽  
John Staffurth ◽  
Fiona Wood

Background The shift from inpatient to outpatient and community cancer care means that more patients with cancer need to manage their condition at home, without the direct supervision of their clinician. Subsequently, research has reported that many patients with cancer have unmet information needs during their illness. Mobile devices, such as mobile phones and tablet computers, provide an opportunity to deliver information to patients remotely. Before designing an app intervention to help patients with cancer to meet their information needs, in-depth qualitative research is required to gain an understanding of the views of the target users. Objective We aimed to develop an app intervention to help patients meet their illness-related information needs in noninpatient settings. This study explored the information needs of patients with cancer and their preferences for an app and desired app features. Specifically, the perceived acceptability of an app, desired app features, and the potential benefits and disadvantages of, and barriers to, an app were explored. Methods Qualitative, one-on-one semistructured interviews were conducted with patients with urological, colorectal, breast, or gynecological cancers (N=23) across two hospitals in South Wales. Interviews were audio-taped, transcribed, and analyzed using a thematic analysis. Results Findings indicated that barriers to information exchange and understanding in consultations, and identification of reliable information sources between consultations, appeared to contribute to patients’ unmet information needs. Consequently, app feature suggestions included a question prompt list, a glossary of cancer terms, a resources feature, and a contacts feature. Anticipated benefits of this type of app included a more informed patient, improved quality of life, decreased anxiety, and increased confidence to participate in their care. The anticipated barriers to app use are likely to be temporary or can be minimized with regard to these findings during app development and implementation. Conclusions This study highlights the desire of patients with cancer for an app intervention to help them meet their information needs during and between consultations with their clinicians. This study also highlights the anticipated acceptability and benefits of this type of intervention; however, further research is warranted.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria Margareta Pertl ◽  
Perez ◽  
Sonya Collier ◽  
Emer Guinan ◽  
Garret Monahan ◽  
...  

Abstract Background: Depression is common among patients with cancer and is associated with lower treatment participation, lower satisfaction with care, poorer quality of life, greater symptom burden, and higher healthcare costs. Various types of interventions (e.g., pharmacological, psychotherapy) are used for the treatment of depression. However, evidence for these among patients with cancer is limited. Furthermore, the relative effectiveness and acceptability of different approaches is unknown because a direct comparison between all available treatments has not been carried out. We will address this by conducting a network meta-analysis (NMA) of interventions for depression among people with cancer using a hybrid overview of reviews and systematic review methodology. Methods: We will search for and extract data from systematic reviews of randomised controlled trials (RCTs) of depression interventions for patients with cancer from inception, before performing a supplemental search for more recent RCTs. We will include RCTs comparing pharmacological, psychotherapy, exercise, combination therapy, collaborative care, or complementary and alternative medicine interventions with pill placebo, no treatment, waitlist, treatment as usual, or minimal treatment control groups, or directly in head-to-head trials, among adults who have a current or previous diagnosis of cancer and elevated depressive symptoms (scores above a cut-off on validated scales or meeting diagnostic criteria). Our primary outcomes will be change in depressive symptoms (standardised mean difference) and intervention acceptability (% who withdrew). Our secondary outcomes will be 6-month change in depressive symptoms, health-related quality of life, adverse events and mortality. We will independently screen for eligibility, extract data, and assess risk of bias using the RoB2 tool. We will use frequentist random-effects multivariate NMA in Stata, Rankograms and surface under the cumulative ranking curves to synthesize evidence and obtain a ranking of intervention groups. We will explore heterogeneity and inconsistency using local and global measures and evaluate the credibility of results using the Confidence in NEtwork Meta-Analysis (CINeMA) framework.Discussion: Our findings will provide the best available evidence for managing depression among patients with cancer. Such information will help to inform clinical guidelines, evidence-based treatment decisions and future research by identifying gaps in the current literature. Systematic review registration: Submitted to PROSPERO (record number: 290145), awaiting registration


Author(s):  
Carmen Francisco Mora ◽  
Alba Ibáñez ◽  
Anna Balcells-Balcells

Background: In recent years, there has been a growing international interest in family quality of life The objective of this systematic review is to understand and analyze the conceptualization of the quality of life of families with children with disabilities between 0 and 6 years of age, the instruments for their measurement and the most relevant research results. Method: A bibliographic search was conducted in the Web of Science, Scopus and Eric databases of studies published in English and Spanish from 2000 to July 2019 focused on “family quality of life” or “quality of family life” in the disability field. A total of 63 studies were selected from a total of 1119 and analyzed for their theoretical and applied contributions to the field of early care. Results: The functional conceptualization of family quality of life predominates in this area, and a nascent and enriching holistic conceptualization is appreciated. There are three instruments that measure family quality of life in early care, although none of them is based on unified theory of FQoL; none of them focus exclusively on the age range 0–6 nor do they cover all disabilities. Conclusions: The need to deepen the dynamic interaction of family relationships and to understand the ethical requirement that the methods used to approach family quality of life respect the holistic nature of the research is noted.


2014 ◽  
Vol 32 (36) ◽  
pp. 4149-4154 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria Teresa Greco ◽  
Anna Roberto ◽  
Oscar Corli ◽  
Silvia Deandrea ◽  
Elena Bandieri ◽  
...  

Purpose Pain is a frequent symptom in patients with cancer, with substantial impact. Despite the availability of opioids and updated guidelines from reliable leading societies, undertreatment is still frequent. Methods We updated a systematic review published in 2008, which showed that according to the Pain Management Index (PMI), 43.4% of patients with cancer were undertreated. This review included observational and experimental studies reporting negative PMI scores for adults with cancer and pain published from 2007 to 2013 and retrieved through MEDLINE, Embase, and Google Scholar. To detect any temporal trend and identify potential determinants of undertreatment, we compared articles published before and after 2007 with univariable, multivariable, and sensitivity analyses. Results In the new set of 20 articles published from 2007 to 2013, there was a decrease in undertreatment of approximately 25% (from 43.4 to 31.8%). In the whole sample, the proportion of undertreated patients fell from 2007 to 2013, and an association was confirmed between negative PMI score, economic level, and nonspecific setting for cancer pain. Sensitivity analysis confirmed the robustness of results. Conclusion Analysis of 46 articles published from 1994 to 2013 using the PMI to assess the adequacy of analgesic therapy suggests the quality of pharmacologic pain management has improved. However, approximately one third of patients still do not receive pain medication proportional to their pain intensity.


2021 ◽  
Vol 42 ◽  
pp. 101290
Author(s):  
Takuya Fukushima ◽  
Jiro Nakano ◽  
Kaori Hashizume ◽  
Kazumi Ueno ◽  
Emi Matsuura ◽  
...  

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