Developing and Testing the Effectiveness of Smart Healthcare Assisted Individualized Symptom Management Education and Home-based Exercise on Frailty, Treatment-related Adverse Events and Quality of Life in Advanced Gastric Cancer Patients Receiving Immunotherapy

July 23, 2026 updated by: Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taiwan

The goal of this randomized controlled intervention is to develop and evaluate the effectiveness of the nurse-led with AI chatbot Individualized Symptom Management Education and Home-based Exercise (AI-ISME&HE) based on The Theory of Symptom Self-Management (TSSM) on frailty, self-efficacy in cancer care, trAE, and quality of life in advanced gastric cancer patients receiving immunotherapy. The main questions it aims to answer are:

  • Can AI-ISME&HE reduces frailty in advanced gastric cancer patients receiving immunotherapy?
  • Can AI-ISME&HE increases quality of life in advanced gastric cancer patients receiving immunotherapy?
  • Can AI-ISME&HE increases self-efficacy in advanced gastric cancer patients receiving immunotherapy?
  • Can AI-ISME&HE reduces all-caused death in advanced gastric cancer patients receiving immunotherapy within two years? Researchers will compare usual routine care to see if AI-ISME&HE can reduce frailty, all-caused death and increase quality of life and self-efficacy.

Participants will not be blinded, but the outcome evaluator will be blinded. The participants will be asked to complete three tasks for 12 weeks:

  • Self-reporting treatment-related adverse events
  • Interacting with AI-ISME&HE for seeking information related to self-management educational materials, including symptom management with the most reported trAEs and prevention from frailty
  • ViviFrail-based exercise

Study Overview

Status

Not yet recruiting

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Estimated)

110

Phase

  • Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

This section provides the contact details for those conducting the study, and information on where this study is being conducted.

Study Contact

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Eligibility Criteria

Ages Eligible for Study

  • Adult
  • Older Adult

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

No

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  1. age ≥18 years
  2. diagnosed as AGC (TNM: T2~T4, N>0, Any M, Stage: III~IV, or unresectable GC)
  3. scheduled to receive the first cycle of immunotherapy
  4. willingness to provide written informed consent after receiving a full explanation of the study

Exclusion Criteria:

  1. a diagnosis of another type of cancer within the past five years
  2. inability to communicate clearly
  3. a diagnosis of dementia
  4. acute pulmonary embolism
  5. acute myocardial infarction
  6. extremity bone fracture within the past three months
  7. bone metastasis

Study Plan

This section provides details of the study plan, including how the study is designed and what the study is measuring.

How is the study designed?

Design Details

  • Primary Purpose: Other
  • Allocation: Randomized
  • Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
  • Masking: Single

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: Intervention
AI-ISME&HE intervention group
Behavioral: AI-ISME&HE
  • Self-reporting treatment-related adverse events
  • Interacting with AI-ISME&HE for seeking information related to self-management educational materials, including symptom management with the most reported trAEs and prevention from frailty
  • ViviFrail-based exercise
No Intervention: Control
Usual routine care

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Level of Frailty Assessed by The Short Physical Performance Battery (SPPB)
Time Frame: Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
The SPPB score from 0-12 points, with 10-12 indicating robust, 7-9 indicating prefrail, and 4-6 indicating frail. It has good reliability (ICC range from 0.82-0.92) and validity.
Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
Level of Frailty Assessed by Comprehensive Geriatrics Assessment
Time Frame: Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.

A total of 8 domains were used to comprehensively assess frailty in cancer patients: Functional status, Comorbidity, Nutrition, Polypharmacy, Social support, Cognition, and Mood. 0 abnormal domains indicate robust, any 1 abnormal indicates pre-frail, and 2 or more abnormality indicate frailty. Each domain can be assessed by different tools. In this study, we chose the tools according as follows:

  1. Functional status: Grip strength.
  2. Comorbidity: Charlson Comorbidity Index by ICD-10 and exclude age and cancer diagnosis. CCI scores > 3 indicates multimorbidity.
  3. Cognition: the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA).
  4. Mood: Geriatric Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9).
  5. Nutritional status: Mini Nutritional Assessment (MNA).
  6. Polypharmacy: number of daily medications.
  7. Social support: live alone or with family.
  8. Falls history: the falling times in the past year.
Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
Level of Frailty Assessed by Geriatric 8 (G8)
Time Frame: Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
The G8 score from 0-17 points, with score ≤14 indicating frailty. It has good sensitivity (86.9%) in cancer patients
Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
Level of Frailty Assessed by Taiwan Cancer Frailty Tool (TCFT)
Time Frame: Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
The TCFT score from 0-5 points, with score >0 indicating frailty. It has good ROC values of 0.857 in cancer patients
Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Score of Quality of Life Assessed by The Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy - General - 7 Item Version (FACT-G7)
Time Frame: Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
It includes 7 items and compromised physical well-being (3 items), emotional well-being (1 items), and functional well-being (3 items). The score of each item is from 0 (not at all) to 5 (very much), and the total score ranging from 0 to 28, with a higher score indicating better quality of life.
Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
Level of Self-efficacy Assessed by The Modified Cancer Behavior Inventory (CBI)
Time Frame: Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
It is a 0-10 Likert-type scale, where 0 indicates no confidence at all and 10 indicates fully confidence.
Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
All Cause Mortality After 2 Year Follow-up
Time Frame: Record patient's survival status at baseline, 1 year after baseline, and 2 year after baseline.
The survival status of the patients will be followed by medical record.
Record patient's survival status at baseline, 1 year after baseline, and 2 year after baseline.
Level of Symptom Severity Assessed by The Patient-Reported Outcomes version of the Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events (PRO-CTCAE®)
Time Frame: Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
The 14 symptoms include fatigue, headache, shortness of breath, nausea/vomiting, rash, diarrhea, decreased appetite, numbness/tingling, general pain, blurred vision, constipation, abdominal pain, itching, and dizziness. Symptoms are assessed by using five-point Likert-type scale to rate symptom frequency (never, rarely, occasionally, frequently, almost constantly), severity (none, mild, moderate, severe, very severe), and interference (not at all, a little bit, somewhat, quite a bit, very much) in the past 7 days. It can composite grading based on an algorithm into grade 0 to 3.
Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
Level of Nutrition Status Assessed by The Mini Nutritional Assessment Short Form (MNA-SF)
Time Frame: Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
It includes 6 items relating to food intake in the past three months, weight loss in the past three months, physical activity, stress, dementia or depression, and body mass index (BMI). The total score ranges from 0-14, with 12-14 representing well, 8-11 representing at risk, and 0-7 representing malnutrition.
Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
Level of Cognitive Function Assessed by The Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA)
Time Frame: Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
The scale consists of 12 items with a total score ranging from 0 to 30, assessing cognitive function across eight domains, including visuospatial construction, executive function, naming, memory, attention, language, abstraction, delayed recall, and orientation. A score of 24 below indicates cognitive impairment.
Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
Level of Depression Assessed by The Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9)
Time Frame: Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
PHQ-9 is a depression muddle from the complete PHQ, including nine DSM-IV criteria for depression, each item scores from 0-3, with a total score range from 0-27. A higher score indicates higher severity of depression, with a score 0-4 as none, 5-9 as mild, and ≥ 10 as moderate-severe depression.
Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
Level of Physical Function Assessed by Grip Strength (GS)
Time Frame: Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
GS will be assessed by JAMAR hydraulic dynamometer, which show good reliability. The participants will be asked to sit in the neutral position with their elbows flexed at 90° and resting at their sides. Next, they need to squeeze the handle of the dynamometer for 3-5 seconds as hard as possible for 3 trials on dominant hand with a rest of 60 seconds. The average and the maximum of the grip strength (kg) will be recorded. Female with GS ≤ 16 kg and male ≤ 26.7 kg refer to frailty.
Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
Changes of Body Composition Assessed by Body Composition Machine
Time Frame: Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.
Body composition will be examined by ACCUNIQ BC300 which is a lightweight, foldable professional body composition analyzer that utilizes bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA) technology. Through eight electrodes and three different frequencies (5, 50, 250 kHz), it performs full-body and segmented (arms, legs, torso) measurements, quickly providing detailed data such as body fat, muscle mass, and water content with high accuracy within 5 minutes.
Changes from baseline, 12 weeks after baseline, and 24 weeks after baseline.

Collaborators and Investigators

This is where you will find people and organizations involved with this study.

Sponsor

Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taiwan

Collaborators

National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University

Investigators

  • Study Chair: I-Wen Chang, PhD, Department of Nursing, Taipei Veterans General Hospital

Study record dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Major Dates

Study Start (Estimated)

July 21, 2026

Primary Completion (Estimated)

July 31, 2029

Study Completion (Estimated)

July 31, 2030

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

July 23, 2026

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

July 23, 2026

First Posted (Actual)

July 29, 2026

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Actual)

July 29, 2026

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

July 23, 2026

Last Verified

July 1, 2026

More Information

Terms related to this study

Additional Relevant MeSH Terms

Other Study ID Numbers

  • 2026-02-009CC
  • 115-2314-B-A49 -016 -MY3 (Other Grant/Funding Number: National Science and Technology Council)

Drug and device information, study documents

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product

No

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product

No

This information was retrieved directly from the website clinicaltrials.gov without any changes. If you have any requests to change, remove or update your study details, please contact register@clinicaltrials.gov. As soon as a change is implemented on clinicaltrials.gov, this will be updated automatically on our website as well.

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