Overview
St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital has long been a leader in pediatric cancer research and survivorship care. One of its cornerstone efforts, the Long-Term Follow-Up (LTFU) Study, has tracked the health outcomes of childhood cancer survivors since 1994. With over 25,000 participants across the U.S. and Canada, the LTFU Study plays a vital role in shaping survivorship care and informing long-term treatment protocols.
To enhance data collection, participant engagement, and research scalability, St. Jude has selected Vibrent Health as its digital health platform partner to help modernize pediatric cancer research. Vibrent is supporting the migration and modernization of the LTFU Study through its robust, secure, and participant-centered technology.
Challenge
The LTFU Study is one of the most comprehensive and enduring studies of childhood cancer survivors in the world. However, as the study expanded, the team faced the reality that their existing platform was going to be sunset. The need for a scalable, participant-centric digital infrastructure became critical. This need also presented an opportunity to address limitations in flexibility and expand the types of data collected from participants beyond survey data and enabling collaboration between decentralized study teams and researchers.
To continue driving breakthrough insights and maintain long-term engagement with participants, St. Jude sought a technology partner capable of transforming the research experience, both for participants and research teams.
Solution: Vibrent’s Digital Health Research Platform
St. Jude selected Vibrent Health for its proven expertise in supporting large-scale, longitudinal research
through a cyber-secure, customizable, and participant-friendly digital platform. Vibrent’s solution delivers:
Scalable, Secure, Cloud-Based Infrastructure
To manage large volumes of participant data while ensuring compliance with HIPAA and federal research regulations.
Participant-Centric Communication
The St. Jude team can streamline and centralize engagement activities and communication with participants to reduce attrition over the long-term. Additionally, participants and their families can securely access study surveys, health updates, and resources via mobile, tablet, or desktop. This allows greater flexibility, especially for long-term survivors who may have moved or changed healthcare providers.
Personalized Participant Portals
Through Vibrent, LTFU participants now benefit from intuitive dashboards that display their study progress, upcoming tasks, and relevant health content tailored to their journey.
Expanded EMR History
For the first time, St. Jude is able to access novel data sources to support innovative research and AI-driven analysis. Participants can digitally connect and share their EMR records from the health systems and practices that treated them both before – and after – treatment at St. Jude.
Support for Real-World Data
Vibrent’s platform enables researchers to capture and analyze real-world data via connection to wearable devices. This continuous stream of real-life data offers a more accurate picture of participants’ daily health experiences, allowing researchers to move beyond episodic snapshots to understand how survivorship evolves in natural settings.
Results & Future Outlook
By migrating to Vibrent, St. Jude is setting a new standard for digital survivorship research. The enhanced platform is expected to:
Boost Participant Retention: Easier access and improved user experience reduce friction and promote sustained engagement, critical for longitudinal studies.
Increase Staff Productivity: Digital, structured data collection minimizes manual entry errors and accelerates analysis timelines.
Expand Research Possibilities: The flexible infrastructure enables integration with wearable devices, EHRs, and biospecimen tracking—opening the door to evolving, multi-modal research.
