Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Anderson, Karen O.
• Palos, Guadalupe R.
• Mendoza, Tito R.
• Cleeland, Charles S.
• Liao, Kai‐Ping
• Fisch, Michael J.
• Garcia‐Gonzalez, Araceli
• Rieber, Alyssa G.
• Nazario, L. Arlene
• Valero, Vicente
• Hahn, Karin M.
• Person, Cheryl L.
• Payne, Richard

Titel

Automated pain intervention for underserved minority women with breast cancer

Ist Teil von

• Cancer, 2015-06, Vol.121 (11), p.1882-1890

Ort / Verlag

United States

Erscheinungsjahr

2015

Quelle

MEDLINE

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• BACKGROUND Minority patients with breast cancer are at risk for undertreatment of cancer‐related pain. The authors evaluated the feasibility and efficacy of an automated pain intervention for improving pain and symptom management of underserved African American and Latina women with breast cancer. METHODS Sixty low‐income African American and Latina women with breast cancer and cancer‐related pain were enrolled in a pilot study of an automated, telephone‐based, interactive voice response (IVR) intervention. Women in the intervention group were called twice weekly by the IVR system and asked to rate the intensity of their pain and other symptoms. The patients' oncologists received e‐mail alerts if the reported symptoms were moderate to severe. The patients also reported barriers to pain management and received education regarding any reported obstacles. RESULTS The proportion of women in both groups reporting moderate to severe pain decreased during the study, but the decrease was significantly greater for the intervention group. The IVR intervention also was associated with improvements in other cancer‐related symptoms, including sleep disturbance and drowsiness. Although patient adherence to the IVR call schedule was good, the oncologists who were treating the patients rated the intervention as only somewhat useful for improving symptom management. CONCLUSIONS The IVR intervention reduced pain and symptom severity for underserved minority women with breast cancer. Additional research on technological approaches to symptom management is needed. Cancer 2015;121:1882–1890. © 2015 American Cancer Society. We evaluated the feasibility and efficacy of an automated pain intervention for improving pain and symptom management in underserved African American and Latina women with breast cancer. The intervention reduced pain and symptom severity for the women, indicating that further research on technological approaches to symptom management is warranted.