[Pre-implementation of electronic patient-reported outcomes at reference centers for head and neck oncology : A roadmap towards patient-centered digitalization].

Background: Electronically captured patient reports (electronic patient-reported outcomes, ePROs) are digital questionnaires filled out by cancer patients. Despite indications of improved clinical care, the integration of ePROs into clinical head and neck oncology is uncharted territory.

Objective: This work outlines the implementation process for ePROs at the University Hospital for Otorhinolaryngology at the Medical University of Innsbruck (ENT Innsbruck).

The Neck-Persistency-Net: a three-dimensional, convolution, deep neural network aids in distinguishing vital from non-vital persistent cervical lymph nodes in advanced head and neck squamous cell carcinoma after primary concurrent radiochemotherapy.

Purpose: To evaluate the diagnostic performance (DP) of the high-resolution contrast computed tomography (HR-contrast-CT) based Neck-Persistency-Net in distinguishing vital from non-vital persistent cervical lymph nodes (pcLNs) in patients with advanced head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) following primary concurrent chemoradiotherapy (CRT) with [18F]-fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography and high-resolution contrast-enhanced computed tomography ([18F]FDG-PET-CT). Furthermore, the Neck-Persistency-Net's potential to justify omitting post-CRT neck dissection (ND) without risking treatment delays or preventing unnecessary surgery was explored.

Methods: All HNSCC patients undergoing primary CRT followed by post-CRT-ND for pcLNs recorded in the institutional HNSCC registry were analyzed.