Physical activity and breast cancer: Results of a focus group to devise novel exercise interventions for women with breast cancer

Objective: To determine, from the diverse perspective of vested members of the health care team, novel exercise intervention strategies to implement within the cancer care institution in order to overcome barriers to exercise participation and promotion for women with breast cancer (BC).Methods: Design: Qualitative descriptive study. Setting: Cancer care institution. Participants: Health care professionals (HCPs) who work with women with BC. Intervention: A focus group was used to answer the research question. A moderator guided the focus group using a semi-structured script. Measurements: The focus group was recorded and transcribed. The transcript was coded independently using topic and analytical coding.Results: Three main issues came forth during analysis. These included a lack of (1) exercise programming and equipment available within the cancer care institution (2) communication with rehabilitation professionals, and (3) effective exercise education strategies available for patients with BC. Specific strategies were suggested to overcome each issue. Limitations: As purposeful sampling was used for recruitment, it is possible that participants agreed to be in this study because they had positive views on the need to incorporate exercise more effectively into practice.Conclusions: To our knowledge this is the first study to include a multidisciplinary team to come to a consensus on a knowledge translation exercise strategy. Findings show that future exercise interventions should implement active interventions within the cancer institution, include rehabilitation professionals as part of the health care team, and use technology to educate patients.