Women with metastatic Breast Cancer (MBC) face different challenges compared to women with earlier stages of breast cancer and today many of their needs are unmet and not well understood. This is well recognized by organisations like Europa Donna and the European Breast Cancer Coalition (ED) who have made meeting the unmet need of women with MBC a top priority.

Gap (a) It is not always clear what MBC women’s unmet needs are and why. The proposed project aims to understand what the unmet needs are. In 2017, Europa Donna Cyprus received an award to collect information on MBC women’s psycho-social needs. This databank will be used to randomly select fifteen women to participate in a focus group to understand and explore the unmet needs, including symptoms, pain parameters, and health information. This will provide a clear picture of what these women need and expect and where gaps exist in meeting these needs.

Gap (b) Women with MBC lack an easily accessible, personalized method to receive information. More importantly, this project will use data on unmet needs to build a web tool which will be online, thus easily accessible and will make use of an avatar (like a personal coach) and thus novel and personalized.  Currently, women rely on health professionals, other advocacy, and patient groups to receive information and support, either verbally or through leaflets and websites. Unfortunately, this type of information provision is not always well received or easy to seek out and navigate through. This project will aim to develop and pilot an avatar-based web tool that will provide information to women with MBC emphasizing on unmet needs identified from the above procedure.   

Gap (c) Women with MBC lack an easily accessible, personalized and evidence-based method to receive support. The avatar-based web tool will also provide short interventions based on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) to improve functionality and alleviate the burden of symptoms like pain and fatigue. There is currently no tool that can be used by women to help them understand and accept their symptoms but at the same time help them to develop coping mechanisms. It is noted that the avatar-based web tool will not replace the role of a medical doctor, a nurse or psychologist but will aim to complement their role and help them reach more women. In this endeavor, the avatar-based web tool will refer patients to their health professionals for support in a stepped care approach.