"Rebuilding Myself"- An intervention enhancing adaptability of cancer patients to return to work: a feasibility study.
Yue Shi, Yujie Guo, Jingjing Dai and 3 others
PMID 40354657WHAT IT FOUND
Cancer patients who had not returned to work and received a three-month structured program plus usual care reported better work-return adaptability at 12 weeks than usual care with WeChat follow-up.
The study had 30 patients, so this shows feasibility, not proven effectiveness.
Key findings
01At week 12, patients who received the intervention plus usual care had higher work-return adaptability scores than patients who received usual care with WeChat follow-up in both reported analyses.
02At week 6, no measured outcome showed a significant difference between the groups.
03The program was feasible: 24 of 30 patients completed it, and the intervention group had higher satisfaction scores than the control group.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for OTsWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
The study was a small feasibility pilot with 30 patients, so it cannot prove effectiveness. Patients knew their group and outcomes were self-reported. The primary adaptability scale was developed by the research team. Follow-up stopped at week 12, so long-term work return was not assessed. The intervention bundled many components, so no single component can be credited. The per-protocol and intention-to-treat analyses were partially inconsistent. Work ability did not show a clear advantage. Missing data were filled with previous measurements. Recruitment used convenience sampling and staff recommendation, so participants may not represent all cancer survivors. The all-randomized text and table disagreed about insomnia.
Declared interests
The article lists funding from the National Social Science Fund of China, the Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province, a Nantong University clinical medicine fund, a Taizhou city research program, and CNPq in Brazil. It does not report commercial funding or an author conflict-of-interest statement.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that this program is proven to improve return to work. It enrolled 30 patients, patients knew their group, outcomes were self-reported, and the program combined many components, so the study cannot show which component caused any difference.