Research Article: Nutrition information-seeking behavior among patients recovering at home after esophageal cancer surgery: a qualitative study
Abstract:
Patients after esophageal cancer surgery often have unmet nutritional information needs during home rehabilitation. However, research on how these patients acquire, understand, and apply nutritional information in real-life contexts remains limited. This study aims to explore the nutritional information-seeking behaviors of post-esophagectomy patients during home rehabilitation, in order to provide evidence for the development of continuous and individualized nutritional information support strategies.
A descriptive qualitative design with purposive sampling was employed in this study. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 15 patients at a tertiary hospital in Guangdong Province, China, between November 2025 and January 2026. Thematic analysis was performed using NVivo 14.0 software to organize and interpret the data.
Four main themes emerged from the interviews: (1) multidimensional nutritional information needs; (2) Diversity of Information Sources; (3) barriers in the process of nutritional information seeking; and (4) behavioral patterns of nutritional information application.
This study demonstrates that nutritional information seeking among patients recovering at home after esophageal cancer surgery is characterized by symptom-driven and fragmented patterns, with patients experiencing substantial difficulties in accessing, interpreting, and applying nutritional information. These findings highlight the need for continuous, individualized, and family-inclusive nutritional information support to strengthen long-term nutritional self-management during postoperative recovery.
Introduction:
Esophageal cancer (EC) is a common malignancy of the upper gastrointestinal tract. According to the 2022 global cancer statistics, its incidence ranks 11th and its mortality ranks 7th worldwide, and surgical resection remains the primary treatment modality ( 1 , 2 ). With the promotion and application of enhanced recovery after surgery (ERAS), the length of hospital stay has been significantly reduced, and the postoperative rehabilitation process has gradually shifted to the out-of-hospital setting ( 3 ). However,…
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