ELETRONIC PATIENT REPORT OUTCOMES: A MULTICENTRICAL STUDY OF SYMPTOMS REMOTE HANDLING IN CANCER PATIENTS

Introduction: The use of digital support technologies for oncological patients through mobile applications has become a trend. In fact, the concept of e-health is already a reality in many hospitals around the world. Based on patient reports, these technologies are becoming highly influential in the care routines against cancer. The nursing care model faces, however, the challenge of adopting and improving the use of these new tools in order to achieve exceptional patient care in this new digital environment. Objective: To identify and describe the results acquired through the use of remote monitoring technologies in cancer patients with an emphasis on reducing number of visits and hospitalizations and also preventing risk situations. Methods: 95 patients in outpatient routine for solid cancers and onco-hematologic of multicentric origins in Brazil were part of this research. From these 95, 11 were from private hospitals and 84 from public hospitals and it was considered a three month timeframe. The patients could report sixteen common symptoms through a mobile application, either on their smartphones or tablets. The objective was to monitor and manage symptoms, enabling follow-up with a specialist nurse who would determine the appropriate type of care based on clinical protocols of digital support through an online chat. Results: Among the 95 patients, 82 (86.3%) received educational intervention, 11 (13.4%) being from private care and 71 (86.6%) from the public health system. A total of 7 patients (7.3%) were sent to Emergency Care Units after conducting risk stratification and among those 2 patients (18%) were from private hospitals and 5 (6%) from public hospitals. These patients received intervention after reporting severe symptoms during the research. Nurses actions frequently started with clinical actions in response to alerts sent by chat and online clinical management, stratifying the risk by evaluating the intensity of symptoms through the ESASs scale with the classification system of Manchester. This allowed to determine preventive educational conduct, vigilance or risk mitigation. Patients referred were later monitored in the Emergency Care Units and were reassigned to nurses responsible exclusively for emergency assistance. Conclusions: Clinical benefits were observed associated to symptom self-reporting routines during cancer treatment through digital support by the specialist nurse.

 

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No conflict of interest has been declared by the author(s).

Publication History

Article published online:
23 October 2019