Co-designing a smartphone-based navigation system for cancer patients.

Abstract

e13727 Background: Kentucky ranks 1st among states for the worst overall cancer incidence and mortality in the U.S., with significant geographic, socioeconomic, and racial disparities affecting the access to quality cancer care. To address these cancer patients’ Social Drivers of Health (SDOH) concerns, we are engaging stakeholders from communities to co-design a new, smartphone-based patient navigation system that offers cancer patients and their families the timely access to support services. We will share our experiences in co-designing this digital SDOH navigation system, called MyPathKY, currently under testing at three cancer centers in Kentucky. Methods: From December 2022 to 2024, a co-design studio was conducted at each of three participating sites: University of Kentucky Markey Cancer Center (UKMCC) in Lexington, KY, Saint Elizabeth Healthcare Cancer Center in Edgewood, KY, and Med Center Health Cancer Treatment Center in Bowling Green, KY, to solicit design ideas from cancer patients, family caregivers, healthcare providers, patient navigators, community-based organizations. Other co-design activities include three patient advisory group meetings at the UKMCC, and the following meetings conducted at each site: quarterly clinical collaborator meetings, usability testing, and a quasi-experimental trial. This study was funded by the Merck Foundation as part of its Alliance for Equity in Cancer Care and the American Cancer Society navigation capacity building grant and was approved by the Institutional Review Boards. Results: Co-design ideas were carefully reviewed with stakeholders and incorporated into the MyPathKY system, including a patient-facing smartphone app for both iOS and Android devices and a web-based dashboard for patient navigators at the sites. The patient app offers tools to report cancer related concerns using the built-in NCCN Distress Thermometer tool. Based on patients’ reported concerns and their locations, the app recommends relevant nearby community services as well as provides guidance and follow-ups to ensure that patients receive services to close the loop. Patients can also access personalized patient education in this app. Site navigators receive email alerts about patients’ high-level distress and can review patients distress reports and their status of contacting community services. They can also proactively suggest services and help connect patients with services. The feedback from stakeholders is mostly positive with suggestions for improvement. The initial testing of the patient app shows acceptable usability with a mean system usability score at 73.7, higher than the suggested threshold at 68. Conclusions: Co-designing a new cancer navigation program with community stakeholders ensured the program’s acceptability and integration with the existing workflow, and in turn will likely maximize its effects and adoption. We will share project updates at the meeting. Clinical trial information: NCT06326567 .