Providing exercise support to cancer survivors is now recommended as a key cancer recovery strategy. This is reflected in the 2018 position statement of the Clinical Oncology Society of Australia, which states that best practice cancer care includes referral to experienced exercise physiologist or physiotherapist with oncology expertise.
Unfortunately, Australia is currently unable to implement this recommendation equitably at a population-level. For many people, access to exercise physiology and physiotherapy is limited by geographical isolation, limited services and/or inability to pay.
Digital health interventions delivered via apps, websites and wearable sensors have the potential to improve the scale and scope of exercise oncology services in Australia. However innovative research is needed to embed tailored exercise prescription and supervision options into digital models of care, and to encourage sustained participation in the prescribed exercises. This will require multi-disciplinary input, drawing on evidence and theory from both exercise and behavioural science and the lived experience of cancer survivors.
This presentation will showcase several digitally-based intervention models that could be utilised in practice to increase access to multi-disciplinary exercise support across the cancer care continuum.