JMIR Cancer

Patient-centered innovations, education, and technology for cancer care, cancer survivorship, and cancer research

Editor-in-Chief:

Taiane de Azevedo Cardoso, BSc, MSc, PhD (Acting Editor-in-Chief), Scientific Editor at JMIR Publications, Canada


Impact Factor 2.8

JMIR Cancer (JC, ISSN: 2369-1999, Impact Factor: 2.8) is a peer-reviewed journal focusing on education, innovation and technology in cancer care, cancer survivorship and cancer research, and participatory and patient-centred approaches. This journal also includes research on non-Internet approaches to improve cancer care and cancer research.

We invite submissions of original research, viewpoints, reviews, tutorials, case studies, and non-conventional articles (e.g. open patient education material and software resources that are not yet evaluated but are free for others to use/implement). 

In our "Patients' Corner," we invite patients and survivors to submit short essays and viewpoints on all aspects of cancer. In particular, we are interested in suggestions on improving the health care system and suggestions for new technologies, applications and approaches (this section has no article processing fees).

In 2023, JMIR Cancer received an inaugural Journal Impact Factor™ of 2.8 (Source: Journal Citation Reports™ from Clarivate, 2023). JMIR Cancer is indexed in PubMed Central and PubMedScopusDOAJ and the Emerging Sources Citation Index (Clarivate).

Recent Articles

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Emotional, Social, Psychological Support for Cancer

Adolescents and young adults often experience existential concerns in addition to side effects during a cancer trajectory, which they often carry alone. Thus, cohesion with other adolescents and young adults with cancer is essential but difficult due to the relatively small, widely dispersed nationwide population. In cocreation, a smartphone app has been developed and includes an information bank, a symptom tracker, and a social community platform, aiming to improve the quality of life (QoL) in this patient group.

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Commentary

Ester et al report the findings from a 2-arm cluster randomized controlled trial nested within a hybrid effectiveness-implementation study, which involved a 12-week exercise and behavior change program for rural and remote Canadians (Exercise for Cancer to Enhance Living Well [EXCEL]). The addition of 23 weeks of app-based physical activity monitoring to the EXCEL program did not result in significant between-group differences in physical activity at 6 months. While several behavior change techniques were included in the initial 12-week intervention, additional techniques were embedded within the mobile app. However, there is currently a lack of evidence regarding how many and which behavior change techniques are the most effective for people with cancer and if these differ based on individual characteristics. Potentially, the use of the mobile app was not required in addition to the behavior change support delivered to both groups as part of the EXCEL program. Further research should involve participants who may be in most need of behavioral support, for example, those with lower levels of self-efficacy. Suggestions for future research to tailor behavior change support for people with cancer are discussed.

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Mobile Apps for Cancer Care and Cancer Prevention and Screening

Mobile health technologies, underpinned by scientific evidence and ethical standards, exhibit considerable promise and potential in actively engaging consumers and patients while also assisting health care providers in delivering cancer prevention and care services. The WASABY mobile app was conceived as an innovative, evidence-based mobile health tool aimed at disseminating age-appropriate messages from the European Code Against Cancer (ECAC) to adolescents across Europe.

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Methods in Cancer Research

Participant recruitment poses challenges in psycho-oncological intervention research, such as psycho-oncological web-based intervention studies. Strict consecutive recruitment in clinical settings provides important methodological benefits but is often associated with low response rates and reduced practicability and ecological validity. In addition to preexisting recruitment barriers, the protective measures owing to the COVID-19 pandemic restricted recruitment activities in the clinical setting since March 2020.

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Reviews on Innovations in Cancer

Self-management (SM) plays an important role in supporting patients’ adaptation to and management of the symptoms of chronic diseases. Cancer is a chronic disease that requires patients to have responsibility in management. Digital technology has the potential to enhance SM support, but there is little data on what SM skills are most commonly supported by digital technology.

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Breast Cancer

Most patients diagnosed with breast cancer present with a node-negative disease. Sentinel lymph node biopsy (SLNB) is routinely used for axillary staging, leaving patients with healthy axillary lymph nodes without therapeutic effects but at risk of morbidities from the intervention. Numerous studies have developed nodal status prediction models for noninvasive axillary staging using postoperative data or imaging features that are not part of the diagnostic workup. Lymphovascular invasion (LVI) is a top-ranked predictor of nodal metastasis; however, its preoperative assessment is challenging.

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Innovations and Technology in Cancer Care

Step counts are increasingly used in public health and clinical research to assess well-being, lifestyle, and health status. However, estimating step counts using commercial activity trackers has several limitations, including a lack of reproducibility, generalizability, and scalability. Smartphones are a potentially promising alternative, but their step-counting algorithms require robust validation that accounts for temporal sensor body location, individual gait characteristics, and heterogeneous health states.

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Breast Cancer

Young women with metastatic breast cancer (MBC) are part of a digitally connected generation yet are underserved in terms of information needs. YouTube is widely used to find and identify health information. The accessibility of health-related content on social media together with the rare and marginalized experiences of young women with MBC and the digital media practices of younger generations imply a considerable likelihood that young women with MBC will seek information and community on the internet.

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Cancer and Prevention in the Media

Graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) is the major cause of short- and long-term morbidity and mortality after allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. Treatment options beyond corticosteroid therapy remain limited, and prolonged treatment often leads to impaired quality of life (QoL). A better understanding of the needs and experiences of patients with GVHD is required to improve patient care.

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Teleoncology

The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the use of telehealth in cancer care and highlighted the potential of telehealth as a means of delivering the much-needed rehabilitation services for patients living with the side effects of cancer and its treatments.

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Innovations and Technology in Cancer Care

Telehealth was an important strategy for maintaining continuity of cancer care during the coronavirus pandemic and has continued to play a role in outpatient care; however, it is unknown whether services are equally available across cancer hospitals.

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Cancer Survivorship

Cancer survivors frequently experience cancer-related financial burdens. The extent to which Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Plus (LGBTQ+) populations experience cancer-related cost-coping behaviors such as crowdfunding is largely unknown, owing to a lack of sexual orientation and gender identity data collection and social stigma. Web-scraping has previously been used to evaluate inequities in online crowdfunding, but these methods alone do not adequately engage populations facing inequities.

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