Editorial: Digital health quality, acceptability, and cost: steps to effective continuity of cancer care

Over 19 million people were diagnosed with cancer globally in 2020 (1). Recently, digital health interventions, including electronic medical/health records, telemonitoring, online patient portals, artificial intelligence (e.g., machine learning) and web-, mobile-, and text message-based interventions have become commonplace across the cancer care continuum, from cancer screening to post-treatment follow-up (2, 3). Benefits of digital health interventions include improved access to and delivery of cancer screening, decision aids, health information, management and tracking tools (e.g., smart watches, apps, websites), including psychosocial and physical health, for people living with and beyond cancer and their caregivers (2–8). Moreover, digital health interventions are scalable, adaptable and can be co-designed with multidisciplinary teams, including end-users, researchers, and clinicians, to address unmet healthcare needs (9). However, many barriers to access and use of digital health interventions exist, especially in low-resource areas and low-income countries (10, 11). Limited access to digital health technologies and limited technological skills or abilities to seek and understand health information from digital health sources (i.e., low digital health literacy) can lead to inequities in care delivery (12, 13). Moreover, receiving too much information from digital health sources can result in negative experiences, including fear (14). Sustainability of digital health interventions can also be problematic due to lack of resources (e.g., funding, workforce capacity) (15). The contributions in this Research Topic highlight the importance of inclusive co-design and equitable delivery of digital health interventions in cancer care.