New Technologies for Understanding and Enhancing Lived Temporality in Chronic Illness
A special issue of Healthcare (ISSN 2227-9032). This special issue belongs to the section "Chronic Care".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 August 2026 | Viewed by 3214
Special Issue Editors
Interests: psychiatry; phenomenology; temporality; lived time; time perception
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Chronic illness management is medically challenging due to profound impacts on patients’ quality of life and lived experiences of time. While modern treatments improve survival rates, they often neglect psychological well-being and disruptions to daily life rhythms. In fact, as they, by definition, continue in time, chronic illnesses impose radical adjustments to the way the patients structure and live this dimension: from experiencing circular rather than linear temporalities (e.g., in relation to repetitive treatment sessions) to dealing with unpredictable illness trajectories, with recursive remission–relapse patterns. These time-related effects of chronic illnesses are critical to address, as they influence the patient’s subjective quality of life and adherence to treatment regimens.
In the field of (empirical) phenomenology, important steps have been taken to study the impact of illness on time perception and temporal awareness. Recent technological advancements promise a deeper understanding and support of these lived experiences. Extended reality (XR) tools have shown utility in enhancing treatment, while artificial intelligence (AI) can offer a nuanced analysis of patient-reported outcomes, making subjective health data an integral part of diagnosis and care planning. Recognizing that "objective" recovery does not always align with subjective well-being, these technologies offer new methods to validate and incorporate the patient’s perspective, enhancing both medical practice and outcomes.
In this Special Issue, we seek interdisciplinary contributions that explore novel, technology-based approaches to understanding and enhancing the lived temporalities of patients undergoing cancer treatment, other chronic illness care (including mental illness), and palliative care. We especially invite contributions that focus on the validation and quantification of lived experience as part of clinical decision-making and the integration of patient-reported outcomes through computational and quantitative tools. We welcome research that bridges medical sciences with the humanities and psychology to address themes of temporality, illness rhythms, and the subjective experience of chronic health conditions. Contributions may include computational tools for lived experience quantification, phenomenological studies on temporal distortions, and innovative applications of XR and AI in understanding and supporting quality of life.
We look forward to receiving your contributions.
Prof. Dr. Marcin Moskalewicz
Dr. Federica Cavaletti
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
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Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Healthcare is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- chronic illnesses
- cancer care
- lived experience
- lived time
- temporal rhythms
- transdisciplinary research
- quantitative phenomenology
- extended reality
- computational tools
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