TY - JOUR
T1 - Real-world Evidence of Implementing eHealth Enables Fluent Symptom-based Follow-up of a Growing Number of Patients with Breast Cancer with the Same Healthcare Resources
AU - Bärlund, Maarit
AU - Takala, Laura
AU - Tiainen, Leena
AU - Kellokumpu-Lehtinen, Pirkko Liisa
N1 - Funding Information:
This study was financially supported by the Competitive State Research Financing of the Expert Responsibility Area of Tampere University Hospital , grant number 9V019 , 9AA027 and 9AB027 . The funder had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. The authors would like to thank breast cancer nurses Titta Leponiemi, Pia Vänskä, and Päivi Hammar for recording manually unscheduled telephone calls made to telephone service. The authors would also like to thank Juha Salonen and Mikko Haltamo for their assistance with the data collection of the Noona application and digital nurse Elina Rinkineva for her assistance with the data collection of the Aurora Callback application.
Funding Information:
This study was financially supported by the Competitive State Research Financing of the Expert Responsibility Area of Tampere University Hospital, grant number 9V019, 9AA027 and 9AB027. The funder had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. The authors would like to thank breast cancer nurses Titta Leponiemi, Pia V?nsk?, and P?ivi Hammar for recording manually unscheduled telephone calls made to telephone service. The authors would also like to thank Juha Salonen and Mikko Haltamo for their assistance with the data collection of the Noona application and digital nurse Elina Rinkineva for her assistance with the data collection of the Aurora Callback application.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 Elsevier Inc.
PY - 2022/4
Y1 - 2022/4
N2 - Background: The growing number of new breast cancer (BC) patients has indicated an urgent need for better tools to monitor patients. Due to the increasing number of unscheduled patient calls, two digital applications were implemented: a callback application (CA) and a digital cancer follow-up application (CFUA). The aim of this study was to evaluate the implementation and added value of digital applications for healthcare professionals in monitoring BC patients from 2012 to 2020. Materials and Methods: As of the end of 2020, 1420 follow-up BC patients were enrolled in the CFUA, which covered 70% of the BC patients in the follow-up phase in the clinic. All unscheduled telephone calls and digital contacts were recorded from January 2015 to December 2020. Results: The implementation of the CA revealed low telephone accessibility (56%), which was improved by 55% by the end of 2020 due to the implementation of the CFUA. In 2019, 59% of all phone service contacts were digitally prepared, and contact reasons were classified by the patients. One of the most important findings was that BC patient contacts more than tripled during the nine-year study period, and these patients could be treated by the same number of nurses due to the implementation of the CA and CFUA. Feedback from two nurses' surveys favored the use of the CFUA. Conclusion: Our study clearly demonstrates that new digital tools are useful in the challenge of a growing number of BC patients in surveillance who should be handled with limited health care resources.
AB - Background: The growing number of new breast cancer (BC) patients has indicated an urgent need for better tools to monitor patients. Due to the increasing number of unscheduled patient calls, two digital applications were implemented: a callback application (CA) and a digital cancer follow-up application (CFUA). The aim of this study was to evaluate the implementation and added value of digital applications for healthcare professionals in monitoring BC patients from 2012 to 2020. Materials and Methods: As of the end of 2020, 1420 follow-up BC patients were enrolled in the CFUA, which covered 70% of the BC patients in the follow-up phase in the clinic. All unscheduled telephone calls and digital contacts were recorded from January 2015 to December 2020. Results: The implementation of the CA revealed low telephone accessibility (56%), which was improved by 55% by the end of 2020 due to the implementation of the CFUA. In 2019, 59% of all phone service contacts were digitally prepared, and contact reasons were classified by the patients. One of the most important findings was that BC patient contacts more than tripled during the nine-year study period, and these patients could be treated by the same number of nurses due to the implementation of the CA and CFUA. Feedback from two nurses' surveys favored the use of the CFUA. Conclusion: Our study clearly demonstrates that new digital tools are useful in the challenge of a growing number of BC patients in surveillance who should be handled with limited health care resources.
KW - Breast Cancer
KW - Digital application
KW - Patient-reported outcomes
KW - PROs
KW - Real-world data
U2 - 10.1016/j.clbc.2021.09.005
DO - 10.1016/j.clbc.2021.09.005
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85117194954
VL - 22
SP - 261
EP - 268
JO - CLINICAL BREAST CANCER
JF - CLINICAL BREAST CANCER
SN - 1526-8209
IS - 3
ER -