{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,4,15]],"date-time":"2026-04-15T22:56:37Z","timestamp":1776293797322,"version":"3.50.1"},"reference-count":24,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"2","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2026,2,5]],"date-time":"2026-02-05T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1770249600000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"name":"Compumedica Research & Innovation"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Informatics"],"abstract":"<jats:p>The cancer care pathway comprises several stages encompassing diagnosis, treatment, and follow-up. Studies show that delays in treatment initiation are associated with worse outcomes, including increased mortality, reduced progression-free survival, and diminished post-treatment quality of life. To address this, patient navigation tools have emerged as a strategy to identify bottlenecks and mitigate delays. In this context, process mining offers a promising approach to discover, model, and optimize workflows using real data from hospital information systems. This paper presents a case study on the application of process mining to analyze care pathways in an oncology clinic. The focus was on identifying critical pathways and delays in the treatment journey to support the patient navigation program. Based on the insights gained, targeted improvement actions were proposed to enhance the patient journey. Using the PM2 methodology, event data were extracted and processed from the clinic\u2019s information systems to model and analyze two key processes: (i) departmental workflows related to ambulatory care and (ii) longitudinal treatment pathways from initial evaluation to discharge. The results confirm the value of process mining for improving oncology patient journey and highlight its potential as a decision-support tool for healthcare administrators and clinical leaders.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/informatics13020028","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2026,2,5]],"date-time":"2026-02-05T15:24:19Z","timestamp":1770305059000},"page":"28","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":1,"title":["Using Process Mining Techniques to Enhance the Patient Journey in an Oncology Clinic"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"13","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-8933-790X","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Ricardo S.","family":"Santos","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Compumedica Research & Innovation, S\u00e3o Paulo 04269-000, Brazil"},{"name":"Department of Computer Science, Aeronautics Institute of Technology, S\u00e3o Jos\u00e9 dos Campos 12228-900, Brazil"}]},{"given":"Jaqueline B.","family":"Braz","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Mogi das Cruzes Oncology Center, Mogi das Cruzes 08730-500, Brazil"}]},{"given":"Michelle","family":"Capelli","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Mogi das Cruzes Oncology Center, Mogi das Cruzes 08730-500, Brazil"}]},{"given":"Alvaro O. I.","family":"Rodrigues","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Mogi das Cruzes Oncology Center, Mogi das Cruzes 08730-500, Brazil"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-7803-1718","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Jos\u00e9 M.","family":"Parente de Oliveira","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Computer Science, Aeronautics Institute of Technology, S\u00e3o Jos\u00e9 dos Campos 12228-900, Brazil"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2026,2,5]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"m4087","DOI":"10.1136\/bmj.m4087","article-title":"Mortality due to cancer treatment delay: Systematic review and meta-analysis","volume":"371","author":"Hanna","year":"2020","journal-title":"BMJ"},{"key":"ref_2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Ungvari, Z., Fekete, M., Buda, A., Lehoczki, A., Munk\u00e1csy, G., Scaffidi, P., Bonaldi, T., Fekete, J.T., Bianchini, G., and Varga, P. (2025). Quantifying the impact of treatment delays on breast cancer survival outcomes: A comprehensive meta-analysis. GeroScience, Epub ahead of printing.","DOI":"10.1007\/s11357-025-01719-1"},{"key":"ref_3","first-page":"1071","article-title":"Assessment of Breast Cancer Treatment Delay Impact on Prognosis and Survival: A Look at the Evidence from Systematic Analysis of the Literature","volume":"3","author":"Williams","year":"2015","journal-title":"J. Cancer Biol. Res."},{"key":"ref_4","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1001","DOI":"10.1001\/jamaoto.2019.2414","article-title":"Association of Delayed Time to Treatment Initiation with Overall Survival and Recurrence Among Patients With Head and Neck Squamous Cell Carcinoma in an Underserved Urban Population","volume":"145","author":"Liao","year":"2019","journal-title":"JAMA Otolaryngol. Head Neck Surg."},{"key":"ref_5","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"e20190406","DOI":"10.1590\/0034-7167-2019-0406","article-title":"Access of the patient to the cancer network under the \u2018Sixty-Day Law\u2019: Integrative Review","volume":"73","author":"Lombardo","year":"2020","journal-title":"Rev. Bras. Enferm."},{"key":"ref_6","first-page":"4","article-title":"The 60-Days Law: Reality of Timely Treatment in the Analysis of a Series of Colorectal Cancer Cases","volume":"69","author":"Pulido","year":"2023","journal-title":"Rev. Bras. Cancerol."},{"key":"ref_7","first-page":"2479","article-title":"Is a law enough to provide a better prognosis for Brazilian melanoma patients or education is still a gap?","volume":"37","author":"Marcelino","year":"2022","journal-title":"Health Plan. Manag."},{"key":"ref_8","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"504","DOI":"10.1007\/s11912-024-01514-9","article-title":"Patient Navigation in Cancer Treatment: A Systematic Review","volume":"26","author":"Chen","year":"2024","journal-title":"Curr. Oncol. Rep."},{"key":"ref_9","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"van der Aalst, W. (2016). Process Mining: Data Science in Action, Springer. [2nd ed.].","DOI":"10.1007\/978-3-662-49851-4"},{"key":"ref_10","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Wicky, A., Gatta, R., Latifyan, S., De Micheli, R., Gerard, C., Pradervand, S., Michielin, O., and Cuendet, M.A. (2023). Interactive process mining of cancer treatment sequences with melanoma real-world data. Front. Oncol., 13.","DOI":"10.3389\/fonc.2023.1043683"},{"key":"ref_11","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1083","DOI":"10.1080\/0284186X.2021.1931712","article-title":"Impact of delay in diagnosis and treatment-initiation on disease stage and survival in oral cavity cancer: A systematic review","volume":"60","author":"Lauritzen","year":"2021","journal-title":"Acta Oncol."},{"key":"ref_12","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"e2613","DOI":"10.7717\/peerj-cs.2613","article-title":"Process mining applications in healthcare: A systematic literature review","volume":"11","author":"Aversano","year":"2025","journal-title":"PeerJ Comput. Sci."},{"key":"ref_13","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Al-Badarneh, H., and Arif, A. (2025). A Systematic Review of Process Mining in Healthcare. Proceedings of the 2025 International Conference on New Trends in Computing Sciences (ICTCS), Amman, Jordan, 16\u201318 April 2025, IEEE.","DOI":"10.1109\/ICTCS65341.2025.10989313"},{"key":"ref_14","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"e1442","DOI":"10.1002\/widm.1442","article-title":"Process mining applications in the healthcare domain: A comprehensive review","volume":"12","author":"Guzzo","year":"2022","journal-title":"WIREs Data Min. Knowl."},{"key":"ref_15","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Kurniati, A.P., Johnson, O., Hogg, D., and Hall, G. (2016, January 29\u201331). Process mining in oncology: A literature review. Proceedings of the 2016 6th International Conference on Information Communication and Management (ICICM), Hatfield, UK.","DOI":"10.1109\/INFOCOMAN.2016.7784260"},{"key":"ref_16","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"260","DOI":"10.1016\/j.eswa.2019.05.003","article-title":"Process mining techniques and applications\u2013A systematic mapping study","volume":"133","author":"Garcia","year":"2019","journal-title":"Expert Syst. Appl."},{"key":"ref_17","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"425","DOI":"10.1007\/978-3-540-92219-3_32","article-title":"Application of Process Mining in Healthcare\u2013A Case Study in a Dutch Hospital","volume":"Volume 25","author":"Fred","year":"2008","journal-title":"Biomedical Engineering Systems and Technologies"},{"key":"ref_18","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Pijnenborg, P., Verhoeven, R., Firat, M., Laarhoven, H.V., and Genga, L. (2021). Towards Evidence-Based Analysis of Palliative Treatments for Stomach and Esophageal Cancer Patients: A Process Mining Approach. Proceedings of the 2021 3rd International Conference on Process Mining (ICPM), Eindhoven, The Netherlands, 31 October 2021\u20134 November 2021, IEEE.","DOI":"10.1109\/ICPM53251.2021.9576880"},{"key":"ref_19","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Savino, M., Chiloiro, G., Masciocchi, C., Capocchiano, N.D., Lenkowicz, J., Gottardelli, B., Gambacorta, M.A., Valentini, V., and Damiani, A. (2023). A process mining approach for clinical guidelines compliance: Real-world application in rectal cancer. Front. Oncol., 13.","DOI":"10.3389\/fonc.2023.1090076"},{"key":"ref_20","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"32","DOI":"10.1016\/j.ijmedinf.2017.03.011","article-title":"Process mining routinely collected electronic health records to define real-life clinical pathways during chemotherapy","volume":"103","author":"Baker","year":"2017","journal-title":"Int. J. Med. Inform."},{"key":"ref_21","first-page":"1","article-title":"Process mining applied to the patient journey: A case study in lung cancer","volume":"1","author":"Iachecen","year":"2023","journal-title":"RBSS\u2014Rev. Bras. Sa\u00fade Supl."},{"key":"ref_22","first-page":"297","article-title":"PM2: A Process Mining Project Methodology","volume":"Volume 9097","author":"Zdravkovic","year":"2015","journal-title":"Advanced Information Systems Engineering"},{"key":"ref_23","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Johnson, O.A., Dhafari, T.B., Kurniati, A., Fox, F., and Rojas, E. (2018). The ClearPath method for care pathway process mining and simulation. International Conference on Business Process Management, Springer International Publishing.","DOI":"10.1007\/978-3-030-11641-5_19"},{"key":"ref_24","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"103994","DOI":"10.1016\/j.jbi.2022.103994","article-title":"Process mining for healthcare: Characteristics and challenges","volume":"127","author":"Martin","year":"2022","journal-title":"J. Biomed. Inform."}],"container-title":["Informatics"],"original-title":[],"language":"en","link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/2227-9709\/13\/2\/28\/pdf","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2026,2,5]],"date-time":"2026-02-05T15:51:47Z","timestamp":1770306707000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/2227-9709\/13\/2\/28"}},"subtitle":[],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2026,2,5]]},"references-count":24,"journal-issue":{"issue":"2","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2026,2]]}},"alternative-id":["informatics13020028"],"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/informatics13020028","relation":{},"ISSN":["2227-9709"],"issn-type":[{"value":"2227-9709","type":"electronic"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2026,2,5]]}}}