Publications by authors named "Wendy Wing Tak Lam"

: Breast cancer survivors often face physical and psychological challenges, including weight gain, metabolic syndrome, and reduced quality of life. To address these concerns, a mobile app-based rehabilitation program called "THRIVE" was developed to improve physical activity, medication adherence, and health-related quality of life (HRQoL) in this population. : This prospective, single-arm study assessed the feasibility and effectiveness of the "THRIVE" app among breast cancer survivors undergoing hormonal therapy.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Unlabelled: Preventable psychosocial suffering is an unmet need in patients with cancer around the world, significantly compromising quality of life and impairing cancer health outcomes. This narrative review overviews the global prevalence of emotional distress and cancer-related needs and the access barriers to psychosocial care. The COVID-19 pandemic has served only to amplify the need for psychosocial care, exacerbating the inadequacy of available psychosocial resources, particularly in low- and middle-income countries.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Psychological distress often co-occurs with sleep disturbances; but the specific mechanisms linking the two remain unclear. A qualitative study explored perceptions and factors associated with sleep disturbances in cancer survivors between patients with varying levels of psychological distress.

Methods: Thirty-three Cantonese speaking mixed type cancer survivors were recruited from a community cancer care program.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Vaccine hesitancy is complex and multifaced. People may accept or reject a vaccine due to multiple and interconnected reasons, with some reasons being more salient in influencing vaccine acceptance or resistance and hence the most important intervention targets for addressing vaccine hesitancy.

Objective: This study was aimed at assessing the connections and relative importance of motivators and demotivators for COVID-19 vaccination in Hong Kong based on co-occurrence networks of verbal reasons for vaccination acceptance and resistance from repetitive cross-sectional surveys.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Young adults in a transitional period may experience more stress and, hence, suffer from an increased risk of unhealthy eating. Executive function (EF) involves not only inhibitory control and mental flexibility (the 'cool' facet) to facilitate resistance to immediate temptations, but also affective decision making (the 'hot' facet) that helps to regulate emotional eating. The effects of different facets of EF and their interactions with perceived stress on eating behaviours remained underexplored.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: Existing evidence of returning-to-work (RTW) after cancer comes predominately from Western settings, with none prospectively examined since the initial diagnostic phase. This study prospectively documents RTW-rate, time-to-RTW, work productivity loss, and activity impairment, within the first-year post-surgery among Chinese women with breast cancer (BCW) and identify potential causal co-variants.

Methods: This observational longitudinal study followed 371 Chinese BCW who were employed/self-employed at the time of diagnosis at 4-week post-surgery (baseline).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: Early sepsis treatment in the emergency department (ED) is crucial to improve patient survival. Despite international promulgation, the uptake of the Surviving Sepsis Campaign (SSC) Hour-1 Bundle (lactate measurement, blood culture, broad-spectrum antibiotics, 30 mL/kg crystalloid for hypotension/lactate ≥4 mmol/L and vasopressors for hypotension during/after fluid resuscitation within 1 hour of sepsis recognition) is low across healthcare settings. Delays in sepsis recognition and a lack of high-quality evidence hinder its implementation.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

The global rollout of COVID-19 vaccines faces a significant barrier in the form of vaccine hesitancy. This study adopts a dynamic and network perspective to explore the determinants of COVID-19 vaccine uptake in Hong Kong, focusing on multi-level determinants and their interconnections. Following the framework proposed by the Strategic Advisory Group of Experts (SAGE), the study used repeated cross-sectional surveys to map these determinants at multiple levels and investigates their interconnections simultaneously in a sample of 15,179 over two years.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: This prospective, single-arm, pragmatic implementation study evaluated the feasibility of a nurse-led symptom-screening program embedded in routine oncology post-treatment outpatient clinics by assessing (1) the acceptance rate for symptom distress screening (SDS), (2) the prevalence of SDS cases, (3) the acceptance rate for community-based psychosocial support services, and (4) the effect of referred psychosocial support services on reducing symptom distress.

Methods: Using the modified Edmonton Symptom Assessment System (ESAS-r), we screened patients who recently completed cancer treatment. Patients screening positive for moderate-to-severe symptom distress were referred to a nurse-led community-based symptom-management program involving stepped-care symptom/psychosocial management interventions using a pre-defined triage system.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: High COVID-19 vaccination uptake rates across all age groups are important for achieving herd immunity. However, age disparity in vaccination acceptance was consistently identified.

Objective: Taking cues from tenets of socioemotional selectivity theory, this study examined how the contextual and psychosocial factors contributed to age-specific COVID-19 vaccination acceptance.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

This study aimed to gain insight from mothers who were successful in breastfeeding maintenance to develop interventions for promoting breastfeeding maintenance. Following the phenomenological framework, this qualitative study recruited mothers who had maintained breastfeeding for at least 4 months for in-depth interviews. A total of 30 in-depth interviews were completed.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Socially disadvantaged individuals and communities consistently showed lower COVID-19 vaccination acceptance. We aimed to examine the psychological mechanisms that could explain such vaccination disparities. This study used data from serial population-based surveys conducted since the COVID-19 vaccination programme being launched in Hong Kong (N = 28,734).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Study Objectives: To examine the trajectories of sleep disturbance in cancer survivors during the first 2 years post-treatment and to investigate whether psychological, cognitive, and physical factors differentiate trajectories.

Methods: A total of 623 Chinese cancer survivors of diverse cancer types participated in a 2-year-long prospective study after the completion of cancer treatment. Sleep disturbance was measured using Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index at 3 (T2), 6 (T3), 12 (T4), 18 (T5), and 24 (T6) months after baseline (within 6-months post-treatment; T1).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: Fear of cancer recurrence (FCR) is a prevalent and frequently debilitating response to a cancer diagnosis, affecting a substantial proportion of cancer survivors. Approximately 30% of local Hong Kong Chinese cancer survivors in a recent survey reportedly experienced persistent high FCR over the first-year post-surgery. This was associated with lower levels of psychological well-being and quality of life.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Purpose: This international study aimed to compare healthcare professionals' perspectives on the unmet needs of their cancer patients with those of family caregivers and to investigate the degree to which patients' age group moderates the associations.

Methods: Healthcare professionals involved in the care for cancer patients and their family caregivers were invited to participate in the International Psycho-Oncology Society (IPOS) Survivorship Online Survey. A total of 397 healthcare professionals from 34 countries provided valid study data.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objectives: To determine the association of palliative care for progressive neurologic diseases with patient- and caregiver-centered outcomes.

Design: Systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials and quasi-experimental studies, including pilot studies.

Setting And Participants: Adults with progressive neurologic diseases (dementia, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson's disease, motor neuron disease, multiple system atrophy, and progressive supranuclear palsy) and their caregivers.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • The study analyzes community vulnerability to pandemics, specifically focusing on COVID-19, through an ecological lens to understand the interconnections between various factors.
  • Researchers reviewed 41 studies to identify indicators of vulnerability, noting that environmental factors, socio-economic status, and health access significantly influence pandemic outcomes.
  • Findings suggest that while strict social distancing can reduce early pandemic impacts, it may worsen conditions for socioeconomically disadvantaged and racially marginalized groups in the long run.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objectives: Older adults have been disproportionately affected by the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. While COVID-19 vaccines are effective for reducing mortality and severe complications, vaccine hesitancy remains a substantial concern particularly among older adults. This was a qualitative study to explore how Chinese older adults reached a decision to delay or refuse the COVID-19 vaccines in Hong Kong.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objective: Cancer patients and their family caregivers have reported various needs that are not met. Recognition of the unmet needs by healthcare professionals may be a first step to adequately and systematically addressing them. Thus, the International Psycho-Oncology Society Survivorship Online Survey was developed to measure healthcare professionals' evaluation about the unmet needs of their patients and family caregivers around the globe.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objectives: Working-age cancer patients face barriers to resuming work after treatment completion. Those resuming work contend with reduced productivity arising from persisting residual symptoms. Existing studies of return to work (RTW) after cancer diagnosis were done predominantly in Western countries.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Vaccine hesitancy can be heightened due to increasing negative reports about vaccines. Emphasizing the social benefits of vaccination may shift individual attention from individual to social benefit of vaccination and hence promote prosocial vaccination. In six rounds of a population-based survey conducted over one major community epidemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in Hong Kong from June to November 2020, we manipulated the question asking about acceptance of a COVID-19 vaccine with or without emphasizing the social benefit of vaccination against COVID-19 (prosocial priming) and monitored the changes of vaccine confidence by news media sentiment on vaccines.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

This was a mixed-methods study comprising a questionnaire-based survey, a qualitative study, and analysis of school newsletters to evaluate elementary school staff's acceptability, delivery challenges and communication about school-located influenza vaccination program (SIVP) in Hong Kong. We found that school staff with lower intention to implement SIVP perceived greater logistical difficulties in arranging SIVP. Challenges regarding program delivery included schools' limited infrastructure, the burden of paperwork, the fear of being overwhelmed by multiple school-based vaccination schedules, lacking confidence in communicating with parents about influenza vaccines, and the difficulties in managing vaccination-related anxiety among children with intellectual disability.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: How antimicrobial resistance (AMR) risk is communicated in news media can shape public understanding and the engagement of different sectors with AMR. This study examined online news media attention for AMR risk and analyzed how AMR risk was communicated using a global sample of English and Chinese news articles.

Methods: A total of 16,265 and 8335 English and Chinese news relevant to AMR risk, respectively, published in 2015-2018 were retrieved from a professional media-monitoring platform, to examine media attention for AMR and its drivers, of which, 788 articles from six main English-speaking countries and three main Chinese-speaking territories were drawn using constructed-week sampling for content analysis.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

We constructed a coronavirus disease community vulnerability index using micro district-level socioeconomic and demographic data and analyzed its correlations with case counts across the 3 pandemic waves in Hong Kong, China. We found that districts with greater vulnerability reported more cases in the third wave when widespread community outbreaks occurred.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF