ICOnnecta’t: Development and Initial Results of a Stepped Psychosocial eHealth Ecosystem to Facilitate Risk Assessment and Prevention of Early Emotional Distress in Breast Cancer Survivors’ Journey

SIMPLE SUMMARY: In current clinical practice, between one third and a half of patients diagnosed with cancer experience distress. Moreover, many of these psychosocial needs often remain unaddressed, although effective interventions exist. Nowadays, eHealth solutions like ICOnnecta’t offer new tools to overcome these limitations and improve access to treatment. This digital ecosystem has been proved to be feasible to implement, reaching good acceptability, use, and satisfaction between users. In addition, it allowed symptom monitoring in real time, facilitating preventive early interventions. Overall, fostering social support appears as a key to facilitate a resilient response after diagnosis. ABSTRACT: Psychosocial interventions prevent emotional distress and facilitate adaptation in breast cancer (BC). However, conventional care presents accessibility barriers that eHealth has the potential to overcome. ICOnnecta’t is a stepped digital ecosystem designed to build wellbeing and reduce psychosocial risks during the cancer journey through a European-funded project. Women recently diagnosed with BC in a comprehensive cancer center were offered the ecosystem. ICOnnecta’t consists of four care levels, provided according to users’ distress: screening and monitoring, psychoeducation campus, peer-support community, and online-group psychotherapy. Descriptive analyses were conducted to assess the platform’s implementation, while multilevel linear models were used to study users’ psychosocial course after diagnosis. ICOnnecta’t showed acceptance, use and attrition rates of 57.62, 74.60, and 29.66%, respectively. Up to 76.19% of users reported being satisfied with the platform and 75.95% informed that it was easy to use. A total of 443 patients’ needs were detected and responsively managed, leading 94.33% of users to remain in the preventive steps. In general, strong social support led to a better psychosocial course. ICOnnecta’t has been successfully implemented. The results showed that it supported the development of a digital relation with healthcare services and opened new early support pathways.