Online Cancer-Related Fatigue Management

Overview

Many individuals who have had cancer experience functional limitations during and after their treatments. The most common side effect from cancer treatment that restricts cancer survivors' completion of daily activities is cancer-related fatigue. Here, we propose to investigate whether an interprofessional approach that targets physiologic, psychologic, and ecological factors will minimize cancer-related fatigue and enhance daily life participation for volunteer cancer survivors living in the community. The interprofessional team will include occupational therapy professor and students from Eastern Kentucky University (EKU), physical therapy and dietitian professors and their students from the University of Dayton, and instructional design instructor from EKU. The approach will include (1) individualized exercise programs-via physical therapy; (2) problem-solving strategies including modifying the environment or activity -via occupational therapy; (3) goal development via physical and occupational therapy; and (4) cancer-related fatigue education via instructional design. We hypothesize that this approach will result in participants experiencing less fatigue, increasing their mobility, improving their quality of life, and being more satisfied with how they perform daily activities.

Setting: Virtual environment 1. Evaluation and weekly meetings will be provided through Zoom® conferencing system provided by EKU or University of Dayton. 2. Educational and Exercise Videos will be accessed within an individual webpage for each participant within the study's website. Research Design Pre-test/Post-test quasi-experimental design without a control group. This research design will allow us to assess if there is a change in the level of fatigue, mobility, quality of life, and/or perceived performance and satisfaction of important activities Screening Individuals who are interested in participating will contact the Occupational Therapy professor--principal investigator (PI) or Physical Therapy professor-collaborator (CL). PI or CL will contact the potential participant either by telephone or email. Within this initial communication, the potential participant will be provided with the following information: time commitment, type of evaluations, and intervention. If the participant continues to be interested, an electronic inclusion criteria screen will be sent. If all inclusion criteria are met, PI or CL will ask the participant for their physician contact information so a medical release form can be sent to them. Physician medical release A release form will be faxed, sent electronically, or mailed to participant's oncology or primary care provider. Once this signed release is received, we will send an electronic version of the informed consent to the potential participant and schedule a time to review it and a tentative time for the initial evaluation. Initial, Weekly, 4-week, and 8-week Standard of Care Cancer Survivor Evaluations Initial Evaluations After the participant agrees to take part in the study and signs the informed consent, the initial evaluation including questionnaires and physical therapy and occupational therapy assessments within one to two visits will be administered by physical therapy and occupational therapy students (PTSI and OTSI). Assessments will be recorded and reviewed by the supervising therapy professor to ensure assessments are performed using standardized methods. After the assessment eight weekly meetings will be schedule. * Estimated length of weekly meeting is 20-30 minutes. * Each exercise session is 30-45 minutes in length depending on which level of exercise the participant is completing. The participant will complete 3 sessions each week. * Each participant will be provided their own webpage, which can only be accessed by them and the researchers. Within the webpage, the researchers will store the prescribed exercise program, including handouts, video and exercise log, and the problem-solving session goals and action plans. Links to the Cancer-Related Fatigue (CRF) educational modules, as they are assigned to the participant will be posted as well.