? Pilot Project Core Fatigue and sleep disturbance are common persistent and disabling chronic symptoms experienced that often co-occur and are experienced by individuals with cancer, stroke, arthritis, multiple sclerosis, congestive heart failure, postpolio syndrome, obstructive sleep apnea and fibromyalgia occurring in 14-96% of individuals. Together these two symptoms can become a self-reinforcing cycle that exacts a physiological and psychological burden on individuals and families and has a profound affect on quality of life. About half of all adults,117 million, have one or more chronic health conditions and experience one or both of these symptoms. Individuals with multiple chronic conditions account for 86% of all health care spending and use more health care services, including hospital days, office visits, home health care and prescription drugs. The costs of fatigue due to decreased productivity in the workplace is estimated to be $136 billion annually. The development of new sensors and wireless technologies combined with powerful computer analysis providing information directly to individuals using smart phones, watches, and tablet based computers is a significant advancement in technology that can return control to individuals to continuously self-monitor symptoms and receive immediate feedback on-demand to more effectively manage these symptoms. The University of Massachusetts Amherst has the capacity to develop, test, and refine these new innovative technologies for use by individuals with chronic health problems to significantly improve symptom self-management. The overall goal of the UManage Center is to develop and refine interventions that can assist individuals with chronic conditions to effectively manage fatigue and sleep disturbance by developing and improving new sensor technologies combined with the power of real time computer based analysis and human factors engineering.
The specific aims of the Pilot Project Core are to: 1) Solicit, peer review, and select competitive pilot project proposals in the science of symptom self-management; 2) Review and monitor proposed pilot projects for compliance with all Federal regulations governing human subjects/vertebrate animals and use of common data elements (CDE); 3) Mentor and expand the capacity of Pilot Project PI/teams to develop competitive research proposals (e.g., NIH R01s) in the science of self-management of symptoms. We solicited and selected two proposed pilot projects for the UMass Center for Building the Science of Symptom Self-Management (UManage Center). These two pilot projects each address symptom self-management using teams assembled by a nurse scientist as the PI on each project. The two pilot projects are: Pilot Project 1: Saccade parameters of persistent cancer-related fatigue: biomarker detection using computational eyeglasses. (PI: Rachel (Klimmek) Walker); and Pilot Project 2: Real-time, continuous cortisol monitoring: Possibilities for stress self-management. (PI: Karen Kalmakis).
