Symptoms and Signs

Determine the effects of the Computerized Symptom Assessment Tool (C-SCAT) versus usual care on the primary outcomes of self-efficacy for symptom management and symptom self-management behaviors

Remote healthcare monitoring for cirrhosis has shown promise in overcoming barriers to accessing specialty care, improving healthcare quality, and reducing mortality. The LiverWatch study is investigating whether a remote nutrition, physical activity, and education intervention can improve health outcomes in those with cirrhosis. In this clinical trial, individuals will be randomized to either enhanced usual care or the LiverWatch intervention. Both groups are given fitbits and asked to increase their step counts. Those in the Liverwatch group will be incentivized for increase their physical activity while also undergoing a personalized nutrition intervention and weekly symptom monitoring and cirrhosis education.

The use of complementary and integrative medicine (CIM) among oncology patients is widespread, with a large body of research-based evidence supporting the ability of these therapies to alleviate symptoms related to cancer and its treatment. Organizations such as the American Society for Clinical Oncology and the European Society for Medical Oncology have included CIM modalities in their treatment guidelines, and many of today's leading cancer centers include CIM in their supportive care service. The proposed study will prospectively examine the impact of a CIM treatment program on the symptom burden, quality of life and function of patients undergoing active oncology treatment. A total of 750 patients will undergo an integrative oncologist (IP) consultation followed by a series of 8 CIM treatments consisting of either acupuncture or touch-related therapies (reflexology, Shiatsu, Tuina, etc.) with the goal of relieving their symptoms. Patients will be allocated to one of the two study treatment arms: the "Patient-Preference Arm", for patients who specify their preference for either acupuncture or touch therapy; and the "Randomized Treatment Arm", for those with no preference, to be randomly allocated to either the acupuncture or touch-therapy subgroup. Patients will be asked to complete the following study questionnaires before and after the treatment regimen: the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer Quality of Life Questionnaire (EORTC QLQ-C30); the Edmonton Symptom Assessment System (ESAS); and the Measure Yourself Concerns and Wellbeing (MYCAW) tool. The primary study outcome will be the change in EORTC Global Health-Status / Quality of Life scores, from pre- to post-treatment. Secondary study outcomes will include EORTC QLQ-C30 functional and symptom scales, single items assessing additional symptoms commonly reported by cancer patients, and perceived financial impact of the disease; ESAS severity scores for 10 quality-of life related items; and MYCAW severity scores for the 2 most significant symptoms, as well as post-treatment narratives. Other secondary outcomes to be assessed include the safety of the study treatments (adverse effects); adherence to conventional treatment regimen; and narratives from the patient's informal caregiver (spouse, parent/child, sibling, friend, etc.).

The protocol will include a 10-week Symptom Management and Survivorship Handbook (SMSH) intervention to address informational needs for the management of physical and psychological symptoms, bundled with telephone delivered health coaching to address their symptom interference with physical, psychological and social functioning. The SMSH intervention, which includes both symptom assessment and management, is simple to implement, scalable, and evidence-based will be delivered to all survivors and caregivers (dyads) in this study, and will serve as an active control. In addition to the SMSH, intervention arm dyads will receive health coaching to address symptom interference and reduce social isolation. Symptom burden is more pronounced in marginalized populations such as Latina/o, rural, older age survivors and their caregivers.18-20 Many health disparities in these populations are underwritten by social isolation due to lack of access, disconnection from linguistically competent health care, mobility, and geographic proximity,21-23 and health coaching can address these issues. The specific aims of the proposed feasibility study are to determine among survivors with metastatic or stage IV cancer and their caregivers (dyads): Aim 1: Demonstrate SMSH plus health coaching feasibility (recruitment, retention, satisfaction (acceptability and appropriateness) for cancer survivors and their caregivers. Benchmarks: Recruitment 70% approached, Retention 75%, and participant satisfaction through qualitative exit interviews in week 11. Aim 2: Collect preliminary data for the intervention impact on whether the SMSH + health coaching results in lowered burden of 24 symptoms (primary outcome) over weeks 1-10, and improved HRQoL (social, physical, psychological) (secondary outcome) at week 11, compared to SMSH alone. Aim 3. Examine the enactment of self-management strategies in SMSH+health coaching versus SMSH alone. The proposed pilot trial will provide proof of concept for the SMSH coupled with a live telephone delivered health coaching intervention to improve symptom management and HRQoL for metastatic breast, GI, and melanoma cancer survivors and caregivers. By addressing physical and psychological symptoms and survivorship using scalable, accessible interventions delivered via telephone, within reach of traditionally underserved populations, the findings have the potential to lay the foundation for the dissemination and implementation of a practical solution to meet survivor-caregiver needs both locally and nationally.

This is a prospective, single-center, exploratory study designed to evaluate the accuracy, user engagement, and user experience of the BaiXiaoAi Companion AI. Upon signing the informed consent form and enrollment, a dedicated "Doctor-Nurse-Patient-AI" WeChat group will be established for each participant. Within the group, the BaiXiaoAi AI will provide timely responses based on patient communications and proactively push information regarding disease management and patient education.

Head and neck cancers are a source of complications and after-effects related to the disease and treatment. These cancers and their treatment alter the quality of life of patients and generate pain with physical and psychological components. Chronic pain affects 36% of patients at 6 months and 30% after this period. These pains are responsible for the consumption of level II and III analgesics in 53% of these patients. At the same time, after the end of treatment, nearly a quarter of patients continued to smoke and half still consumed alcohol at least twice a week. The hypothesis of this research is to investigate the correlation between pain and the continuation of addictions, the occurrence of depressive states, asthenia and the alteration of the patients' global quality of life. The investigators propose a two-center prospective cohort study to evaluate this hypothesis at 6 months after radiotherapy treatment. This study is planned to include 120 patients with a first head and neck cancer whit radiotherapy as part of their treatment sequence. The expected duration of inclusion is 18 months. The identification of factors affecting survival, quality of life and patient compliance is essential to determine appropriate management, particularly by creating appropriate therapeutic education programs.

Introduction: Person-centred care is based on the assumption that every person has resources that should be used in the care situation. In order for this to happen the patient has to be able to effectively communicate his/her symptoms. This protocol describes the analysis of a digital picture-based tool for communication support for children with cancer aged 5-17 years, who undergo high-dose methotrexate treatment. The advantage of a non-linguistic based platform, beside the expected clinical outcomes, is that it can be used in multiple national studies with minimal translation. Methods and analysis: Two studies will be conducted in a hybrid design, i.e., a crossover design will be used for the intervention (effects), and a mixed-methods design will be used for the process evaluation. Qualitative interviews will be carried out with children with cancer, their legal guardians and case-related healthcare professionals as part of the process evaluation. The interviews will address the experiences of the intervention and frequency of use from the child's perspective. Interview transcripts will be analyzed qualitative descriptively. The digital communication tool will collect child self-reports of symptoms/emotions. The children will be monitored for biomarkers of stress and pain (neuropeptides, neurosteroids and peripheral steroids) in venous blood samples, in-app estimation levels for the children, drug consumption. Person-centeredness will be evaluated with the questionnaire Visual CARE Measure. Ethics: Ethical approval was obtained from the Swedish Ethical Review Authority (ref 2019-02392; 2020-02601).

Currently, aspects related to the effects of anticancer treatments and the quality of life of patients and their needs are still poorly documented at the Rafael Institute. Thus this study will meet a dual objective: (1) the establishment of a registry to collect data on the safety and effectiveness of innovative and expensive anticancer drugs when administered in real life and (2) a measurement quantitative quality of life of patients treated with these drugs.

This randomized controlled trial aims to test if a combination of medical hypnosis and ear acupuncture improves sleep quality in patients with advanced cancer during a hospital stay in a palliative care unit. Patients submitted to our palliative care unit will receive a medical hypnosis and ear acupuncture on the second day of their stay. Sleep quality will be measured using validated patient-reported outcome measures at baseline and after 7 days. Additionally, the use of sleep medication will be documented as a secondary outcome. The intervention will be compared to a sham medical hypnosis and ear acupuncture to see if the effect of the true intervention has a unique effect.

Psychiatric diagnostics involve collecting information about a patient's symptoms, age of onset, development over time, relation to external stress, and ability to function and experience suffering. This information is classified using ICD (World Health Organisation) and DSM (American diagnosis system). Currently, there is a lack of a scientifically evaluated system to support these diagnostics. This project seeks to develop and evaluate a set of self-assessment scales which collect and classify relevant data and serve as support for clinicians. These scales are made up of questions about typical psychiatric symptoms, which are assessed and evaluated using a statistical method (Item Response Theory). After testing and evaluation, a scale could consist of approximately 10 items or less. The scales are then tested together to see if the number of items and scales can be reduced further.

The aim of this study is to analyze a population with symptoms associated with adverse reactions to foodstuffs (ARFS). To determine the levels of food-specific immunoglobulin G4 (IgG4) and immunoglobulin E (IgE) antibody reactions (AbR).