As rising numbers of people are living with the long-term impact of cancer, digital health is playing an increasingly important role in the monitoring and support of survivors and their caregivers. This article reviews current evidence, practice and developments, and identifies emerging issues and opportunities.
Digital health innovations, primarily using internet or smartphone-enabled applications, have been successfully developed, particularly in the areas of symptom management, decision-making, survivorship and follow-up care and palliative care. The research is characterized by much developmental activity, and evidence is accruing for efficacy and effectiveness. Opportunities afforded by digital health include timelier and patient-centred evidence-based care, offering improved clinical outcomes and independence. Barriers to implementation include lack of patient and professional engagement, perceived burden, depersonalization and missed care.
There is much enthusiasm for the role of digital health in monitoring and providing support to cancer survivors, but further research is needed to establish clinical efficacy and understand the mechanisms for successful implementation in practice. The role of wearables, the internet of things and big data analytics is yet to be fully explored in supportive cancer care and may present new opportunities to enhance care and survivor experience.
This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 1. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 18 June 2019.
All research outputs
#17,982,872
of 23,096,849 outputs
Outputs from Current Opinion in Supportive and Palliative Care
#395
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Outputs of similar age
#240,894
of 335,730 outputs
Outputs of similar age from Current Opinion in Supportive and Palliative Care
#14
of 28 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 23,096,849 research outputs across all sources so far. This one is in the 19th percentile – i.e., 19% of other outputs scored the same or lower than it.
So far Altmetric has tracked 655 research outputs from this source. They receive a mean Attention Score of 4.1. This one is in the 33rd percentile – i.e., 33% of its peers scored the same or lower than it.
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