JMIR Cancer

COVID-19 has had significant health-related and behavioral impacts worldwide. Cancer survivors (hereafter referred to as “survivors”) are particularly prone to behavioral changes and are encouraged to be more vigilant and observe stricter social distancing measures.

Cardiovascular health is of increasing concern to breast cancer survivors and their health care providers, as many survivors are more likely to die from cardiovascular disease than cancer. Implementing clinical decision support tools to address cardiovascular risk factor awareness in the oncology setting may enhance survivors’ attainment or maintenance of cardiovascular health.

Cancer diagnosis and cancer treatment can cause high levels of distress, which is often not sufficiently addressed in standard medical care. Therefore, a variety of supportive nonpharmacological treatments have been suggested to reduce distress in patients with cancer. However, not all patients use these interventions because of limited access or lack of awareness. To overcome these barriers, mobile health may be a promising way to deliver the respective supportive treatments.

Latina breast cancer survivors experience poorer health-related quality of life (HRQoL), greater symptom burden, and more psychosocial needs compared to non-Latina breast cancer survivors. eHealth platforms such as smartphone apps are increasingly being used to deliver psychosocial interventions to cancer survivors. However, few psychosocial eHealth interventions have been developed specifically for Latina breast cancer survivors. Further, little is known about how Latinas, in general, engage with eHealth interventions and whether specific participant characteristics are associated with app use in this population. We evaluated the use of 2 culturally informed, evidence-based smartphone apps for Latina breast cancer survivors—one that was designed to improve HRQoL and reduce symptom burden (My Guide) and the other to promote healthy lifestyle behaviors (My Health).

The Symptom Assessment and Management (SAM) program is a structured, online, nurse-supported intervention to support symptom self-management in people receiving adjuvant chemotherapy post surgery for breast or colorectal cancer.

Long-term side-effects associated with different prostate cancer treatment approaches are common. Sexual challenges are the most frequently occurring issues and can result in increased psychological morbidity. It is recognized that barriers to communication can make initiating discussions around sexual concerns in routine practice difficult. Health care professionals need to routinely initiate conversations, effectively engage with patients, and assess needs in order to provide essential support. One proposed method that could support health care professionals to do this involves the use of prompts or structured frameworks to guide conversations.

eHealth technologies have been found to facilitate health-promoting practices among cancer survivors with BMI in overweight or obese categories; however, little is known about their engagement with eHealth to promote weight management and facilitate patient-clinician communication.

A reproductive health implication of the increasing incidence of cancer among women is the impact of cancer treatment on fertility.

The interplay of virtual care and cancer care in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic is unique and unprecedented. Patients with cancer are at increased risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection and have worse outcomes than patients with COVID-19 who do not have cancer. Virtual care has been introduced quickly and extemporaneously in cancer treatment centers worldwide to maintain COVID-19–free zones. The outbreak of COVID-19 in a cancer center could have devastating consequences. The virtual care intervention that was first used in our cancer center, as well as many others, was a landline telephone in an office or clinic that connected a clinician with a patient. There is a lack of virtual care evaluation from the perspectives of patients and oncology health care providers. A number of factors for assessing oncology care delivered through a virtual care intervention have been described, including patient rapport, frailty, delicate conversations, team-based care, resident education, patient safety, technical effectiveness, privacy, operational effectiveness, and resource utilization. These factors are organized according to the National Quality Forum framework for the assessment of telehealth in oncology. This includes the following 4 domains of assessing outcomes: experience, access to care, effectiveness, and financial impact or cost. In terms of virtual care and oncology, the pandemic has opened the door to change. The lessons learned during the initial period of the pandemic have given rise to opportunities for the evolution of long-term virtual care. The opportunity to evaluate and improve virtual care should be seized upon.

It has been reported that the incidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection is higher in patients with cancer than in the general population and that patients with cancer are at an increased risk of developing severe life-threatening complications from COVID-19. Increased transmission and poor outcomes noted in emerging data on patients with cancer and COVID-19 call for aggressive isolation and minimization of nosocomial exposure. Palliative care and oncology providers are posed with unique challenges due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Telepalliative care is the use of telehealth services for remotely delivering palliative care to patients through videoconferencing, telephonic communication, or remote symptom monitoring. It offers great promise in addressing the palliative and supportive care needs of patients with advanced cancer during the ongoing pandemic. We discuss the case of a 75-year-old woman who was initiated on second-line chemotherapy, to highlight how innovations in technology and telehealth-based interventions can be used to address patients’ palliative and supportive care needs in the ongoing epidemic.

Exercise and a healthy diet can improve the quality of life and prognosis of prostate cancer survivors, but there have been limited studies on the feasibility of web-based lifestyle interventions in this population.

Cancer is a leading cause of death in the United States and across the globe. Cancer screening is an effective preventive measure that can reduce cancer incidence and mortality. While cancer screening is integral to cancer control and prevention, due to the COVID-19 outbreak many screenings have either been canceled or postponed, leaving a vast number of patients without access to recommended health care services. This disruption to cancer screening services may have a significant impact on patients, health care practitioners, and health systems. In this paper, we aim to offer a comprehensive view of the impact of COVID-19 on cancer screening. We present the challenges COVID-19 has exerted on patients, health care practitioners, and health systems as well as potential opportunities that could help address these challenges.