NIH Grant Funds Efforts to Advance At-Home Cancer Care

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is supporting the Managing Symptoms and Psychological Distress During Oral Anti-Cancer Treatment grant, facilitating the utilization of advanced technology by Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center and other institutions to extend cancer management to patients' homes. Tracy Crane, PhD, RDN, the Director of Lifestyle Medicine, Prevention, and Digital Health at Sylvester, serves as one of the principal investigators for this project. She stated that an increasing portion of cancer care is being administered in patients' homes. To adapt to this evolving landscape, researchers at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, affiliated with Sylvester, have harnessed technology. This initiative incorporates a digital-intervention component, featuring an automated voice-response system derived from the University of Miami's proprietary software platform, My Wellness Research. Utilizing wearable device data and machine learning, researchers can gain insights into patients' conditions and utilize a voice-activated system for patient communication via phone calls.