Technology-Assisted Psychosocial Interventions for Childhood, Adolescent, and Young Adult Cancer Survivors: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Abstract

Purpose: Technology-assisted interventions are essential in supporting cancer survivors' psychosocial outcomes, especially for childhood, adolescent, and young adult (AYA) cancer survivors, a tech-savvy generation. This study aims to systematically evaluate review and meta-analyze technology-assisted interventions for childhood and AYA cancer survivors.

Methods: Following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA) guidelines, the study team used a pre-set of key words and searched studies across 11 electronic databases and 4 professional websites, and conducted a manual search of reference lists from published reviews. Meta-analysis of small sample size corrected Hedges' g was conducted using meta-regression with robust variance estimation.

Results: Final analysis included a total of 28 clinical trials, including 237 effect sizes reported an overall statistically significant treatment effect of technology-assisted psychosocial interventions for childhood and AYA cancer survivors, g = 0.382, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.243 to 0.521, p < 0.0001. Subgroup analysis revealed that distraction-based interventions and interventions for psychosocial and emotional health were overall statistically significant, whereas interventions for childhood and AYA cancer survivors' cancer knowledge outcomes and physical and functional health outcomes were statistically nonsignificant. Moderator analysis found intervention target was a significant moderator.

Conclusions: Technology-assisted interventions for childhood and AYA cancer survivors were overall effective across domains of survivorship outcomes. Favorable evidence was found primarily for childhood cancer survivors with limited support for AYA cancer survivors.

Implications for Cancer Survivors: Although existing technology-assisted interventions are overall promising, research support for cancer survivors from different age groups and with different psychosocial challenges varies and should be considered individually.