Embedding mobile health technology into the Nurses' Health Study 3 to study behavioral risk factors for cancer.

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Background Physical activity and sleep are behavioral risk factors for cancer that may be influenced by environmental exposures, including built and natural environments. However, many studies in this area are limited by residence-based exposure assessment and/or self-reported, time-aggregated measures of behavior. Methods The Nurses' Health Study 3 (NHS3) Mobile Health Substudy is a pilot study of 500 participants in the prospective NHS3 cohort who use a smartphone application and a Fitbit for seven-day periods, four times over a year, to measure minute-level location, physical activity, heart rate, and sleep. Results We have collected data on 435 participants, comprising over 6 million participant-minutes of heart rate, step, sleep, and location. Over 90% of participants had five days of ≥600 minutes of Fitbit wear-time in their first sampling week, and this percentage dropped to 70% for weeks 2-4. Over 819 sampling weeks, we observed an average of 7,581 minutes of heart rate and step data (IQR: 6,651, 9,645) per participant-week, and >2 million minutes of sleep in over 5,700 sleep bouts. We have recorded location data for 5,237 unique participant-days, averaging 104 location observations per participant-day (IQR: 103, 107). Conclusions This study describes a protocol to incorporate mobile health technology into a nationwide prospective cohort to measure high-resolution objective data on environment and behavior. Impact This project could provide translational insights into interventions for urban planning to optimize opportunities for physical activity and healthy sleep patterns to reduce cancer risk.

Investigators
Abbreviation
Cancer Epidemiol. Biomarkers Prev.
Publication Date
2020-02-25
Pubmed ID
32098894
Medium
Print-Electronic
Full Title
Embedding mobile health technology into the Nurses' Health Study 3 to study behavioral risk factors for cancer.
Authors
Fore R, Hart JE, Choirat C, Thompson JW, Lynch K, Laden F, Chavarro JE, James P