From Misinformation to Meaningful Engagement: A Methodological Framework for Audiovisual Cancer Education in Low-Resource Settings

Abstract

Patient education in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) is increasingly challenged by declining engagement with written materials and widespread exposure to misinformation on social media. At a comprehensive cancer center in Egypt, a needs assessment identified a high prevalence of misconceptions and minimal reliance on healthcare professionals as information sources. This paper describes a reproducible methodology for developing and implementing culturally adapted audiovisual breast cancer education delivered in colloquial Egyptian dialect, supported by multidisciplinary scientific governance and regulatory review. We report the end-to-end process for topic prioritization, script development, dialect adaptation, storyboarding, production, iterative multidisciplinary scientific validation, regulatory submission and approval, and clinical integration within structured education workflows. We position the model within an implementation science lens, emphasizing acceptability, feasibility, fidelity, and sustainability. The model operationalized a standardized workflow producing an initial video set targeting (1) misconception correction and (2) simplified disease understanding, followed by iterative topic expansion into lymphedema, radiotherapy toxicities, and chemotherapy toxicities. Patient preference data and satisfaction/acceptability signals for audiovisual delivery and dialect comprehensibility have been reported in associated program evaluations and support scalability of this approach. A dialect-based audiovisual education model governed through multidisciplinary scientific review and regulatory oversight is feasible within routine oncology care in LMIC settings. This paper provides a transferable framework and reporting structure to support replication by other institutions, including governance safeguards for multi-stakeholder and public–private partnership contexts.