Using m-health apps in oncology : A review from 2015 to 2022
Conference Paper
Overview
Research
Identity
Additional Document Info
View All
Overview
abstract
The increased use of smartphones and the COVID-19
pandemic directly influenced the development of remote tools in
several areas. In the context of oncology, it was no different, as
several studies address health care or services related to mobile
devices. Apps aimed at the medical field (m-health) focus directly
on monitoring symptoms and improving interaction between
health professionals and patients, combined with the convenience
of smartphones. In this context, this work aims to address recent
studies on the use of m-health in the clinical practice of oncological
diseases and report the characteristics of the apps involved. For
this, a review of m-health focused on oncology was conducted using
the PubMed and Science Direct databases. The investigation was
carried out using tools inherent in international databases and was
limited to articles published between 2015 and 2022. In total, 34
articles were analyzed, with a higher frequency of publications
between 2019 and 2022. The resources observed were patient
follow-up, prevention of signs and symptoms, monitoring of
treatment and aid in prognosis and diagnosis of patients. It is
concluded that a close collaboration among patients, health
professionals, and information technology professionals is
necessary to optimize symptom recognition and improve patientprofessional
communication. Although the pandemic has
intensified the increase in the use of m-health, its use is expected to
increase in the post-pandemic scenario, bearing in mind the
changes in social dynamics and the growing dissemination of
technologies.
This work has been supported by Foundation for Science and
Technology (FCT, Portugal) for financial support through
national funds FCT/MCTES (PIDDAC) to CeDRI
(UIDB/05757/2020 and UIDP/05757/2020), SusTEC
(LA/P/0007/2021) and NORTE-01-0247-FEDER-072598
iSafety: Intelligent system for occupational safety and wellbeing
in the retail sector. Laíres A. Lima thanks the Fundação
para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT), Portugal, for the Ph.D. Grant
2022.13393.BD.