ASPO Abstracts
Telehealth exercise among older cancer survivors: Who is participating and how much?
Category: Lifestyles Behavior, Energy Balance & Chemoprevention
Conference Year: 2022
Abstract Body:
Older cancer survivors commonly experience debilitating combined effects of cancer treatment and aging that can be attenuated through regular participation in exercise; yet, less than 40% of older cancer survivors meet current exercise guidelines. Currently, little is known regarding older survivors' participation in telehealth exercise. Purpose: To describe older cancer survivors that participated in a hospital-based telehealth exercise oncology program. Methods: Data of older cancer survivors (70+ years) who participated in a hospital-based exercise oncology program between March 2020 to August 2021 were retrieved from medical records. Descriptive statistics are presented as means and standard deviations for continuous variables and frequencies and percentages for categorical variables. Descriptive data analysis was conducted in SPSS v26.0. Results: Older cancer survivors (n=111) were 75.7±5.5 years old (range: 70-98 years). The majority of older survivors were white (94.6%), non-Hispanic (94.6%), and female (50.5%). The most common cancer types (n=25) were prostate (n=30; 27.0%), breast (n=23; 20.7%), and multiple myeloma (n=10; 9.0%), respectively. All cancer stages were represented among the 96 survivors with a history of one cancer type (stage I: n=22, 19.8%; II: n=21, 18.9%; III: n=19, 17.1%; IV: n=18, 16.2%; not staged: n=13, 11.7%; unknown: n=3, 2.7%). A total of 29.7% (n=33) of survivors were on active treatment with 22.5% (n=25) undergoing two or more treatment types. Chemotherapy was the most common treatment type (n=21, 18.9%) followed by surgery (n=17, 15.3%), hormone therapy (n=12, 10.8%), radiation (n=10, 9.0%), and immunotherapy (n=6, 5.4%). Collectively, survivors participated in a total of 1337 telehealth exercise visits over 17-months; visits completed ranged from 1-78, with 32.4% completing ≥10 visits. Demographic data were similar among survivors who completed ≥10 visits: however, 13.9% were on active treatment. Conclusions: Findings demonstrate the feasibility of telehealth exercise among older cancer survivors of varying cancer types and stages. Telehealth exercise may also be feasible for older survivors on active treatment. Future research should examine factors influencing older survivors' adherence to telehealth exercise programs.
Keywords: telehealth exercise; older cancer survivors; exercise oncology