Digital solutions for tackling mental health in cancer patients and their families: The ALTHEA project

Abstract

Despite advances in cancer treatment, the growing global cancer burden underscores the need for comprehensive and supportive care to address the needs of patients and their families. However, access to psycho-oncological support remains often limited across healthcare systems. This could be related to factors such as resource constraints and insufficient integration of psychological care into routine oncological pathways. Individual-level barriers also exist, including low awareness of available services, stigma, and heterogeneity in patients’ perceived needs and help-seeking attitudes. Nevertheless, psychological burden can significantly influence patients’ experience of the treatment pathway, influencing cognitive clarity, perceived self-efficacy, communication, risk perception, decision-making, and all areas of daily life. In this context, digital mental health solutions have emerged as promising tools to enhance accessibility, continuity of care, and personalisation of support. In this manuscript, we aim to describe the structure of the ALTHEA project (“tAckling menTal Health cancer patients and their families: digital solutions for bEtter cAre”), which focuses on the development of a novel web-based digital platform targeting cancer patients and their informal caregivers’ mental health across different stages of the care pathway. ALTHEA is distinguished by the presence of screening, classification into different support profiles, and tailored interventions within a single platform, as well as by its co-creation approach involving patients and stakeholders. In this line, the ALTHEA project represents a timely opportunity to integrate digital health solutions into psycho-oncology care, improving mental health outcomes, enhancing patient empowerment, and promoting a more holistic approach to cancer care.