Community Health Workers in Diabetes Care in American Samoa (DCAS)

October 5, 2015 updated by: Stephen McGarvey, National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK)

Diabetes Care in American Samoa

As type 2 diabetes prevalence increases in the United States, the burden of diabetes falls more on groups with greater barriers to care, such as language and cultural differences, and lower economic resources. Healthy People 2010 targeted diabetes as one of six diseases for the elimination of racial and ethnic health disparities. These disparities extend to the US Territory of American Samoa, where the proportion of adults >18 years with diabetes was 19.6% in 2002, compared to 6.4% of US adults. There have been no reported diabetes interventions in Samoans in the US. The overall purpose of this application is to translate recent advances in diabetes care into clinical practice for the American Samoan community by improving methods of health care delivery and methods of diabetes self management. We will conduct a randomized clinical trial to test the effectiveness of a community health worker (CHW) and primary-care coordinated intervention to provide outreach, education and support to 352 type 2 diabetes patients and their families in American Samoa. The CHW intervention will utilize evidence-based algorithms and protocols to prompt risk behavior interventions, communication with health care team, and visit schedule. The individual treatment action plans are also guided by the Precede-Proceed Model. The outcomes at a one-year follow-up will include glycosolated hemoglobin (HbA1c), cardiovascular disease risk factors, diet and exercise behaviors, and adherence to diabetes care guidelines. The study hypothesis is that diabetes patients in the CHW trial arm will have lower HbA1c levels, lower cardiovascular disease risk factor levels, increased exercise behaviors and healthy dietary intakes and greater adherence to diabetes care such as adherence to prescribed medications, keeping medical appointments for diabetes care and specialty referrals. The intervention builds upon best clinical practices for CHWs in diabetes care by translating effective strategies to American Samoans, while also extending prior CHW research, by using a model that is potentially replicable in other ethnic minority populations suffering the burden of diabetes.

Study Overview

Status

Completed

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Detailed Description

We will perform a clinical trial to test the effectiveness of a community health worker (CHW) and primary-care coordinated intervention to provide outreach, education and support to diabetes patients and their families. The outcomes at a one-year follow-up will include glycosolated hemoglobin (HbA1c), CVD risk factors, diet and exercise behaviors, and adherence to diabetes care guidelines. The intervention builds upon best practices to date with CHWs, by translating effective strategies to Samoans, an ethnic minority population with no prior intervention research, while also extending prior CHW research, by using a model that is potentially replicable anywhere that uses outreach strategies in the context of primary care. This application builds on the current more limited activities of CHWs at the Tafuna Family Health Center (TFHC), a primary care health center established in 1998, operated by the American Samoa Government Department of Health, and designated as a community health center by the U.S. Bureau of Primary Health Care in 2003.

We will conduct a randomized controlled trial to test the effectiveness of a CHW outreach intervention, compared to usual care (UC) in a wait-list control group. The specific aims are:

A.1. To improve control of diabetes: We hypothesize that the CHW outreach intervention group will have greater one-year reductions in glycosolated hemoglobin (HbA1c) levels compared to the UC group.

A.2. To improve cardiovascular risk factors: We hypothesize that the CHW outreach intervention group will have greater one-year reductions in systolic and diastolic blood pressure, BMI, and abdominal circumference compared to the UC Group.

A.3. To improve diet and physical activity behaviors: We hypothesize that the diabetes patients randomized to the CHW intervention will have a greater one-year increase in favorable dietary and physical activity behaviors associated with self-management of their diabetes compared to the UC group.

A.4. To improve adherence to processes of diabetes care. The CHW group will have a higher percent of diabetes patients with the following American Diabetes Association (ADA) standards of care: 1) at least two HBA1c tests in the last year (at least 3 months apart), 2) percent of patients with documentation of self-management goals in the past 12 months, 3) percent of patients with a dental exam in past year, 4) percent of patients with a dilated eye exam in the past year, 5) percent of patients with a documented foot exam in the past year. We hypothesize that the CHW intervention will outperform UC on these variables over one year.

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Actual)

268

Phase

  • Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

This section provides the contact details for those conducting the study, and information on where this study is being conducted.

Study Locations

  • American Samoa
      • Pago Pago, American Samoa, 96799
        • Tafuna Family Health Center

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Eligibility Criteria

Ages Eligible for Study

21 years to 75 years (Adult, Older Adult)

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

No

Genders Eligible for Study

All

Description

Inclusion Criteria: diagnosis of type 2 diabetes, age 21 years and above, resident of American Samoa receiving primary care at Tafuna Family Health Center -

Exclusion Criteria: pregnancy, receiving kidney dialysis

-

Study Plan

This section provides details of the study plan, including how the study is designed and what the study is measuring.

How is the study designed?

Design Details

  • Primary Purpose: Treatment
  • Allocation: Randomized
  • Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
  • Masking: Single

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: Behavioral
Community Health Worker home visits
Behavioral: Community Health Worker home visits
Community health workers will educate diabetes patients and families about need for regular medical care, taking medications, increasing exercise patterns, improving diet, keeping medical referral exams for specialty.
Active Comparator: Usual Care
Usual Care, Wait List Control
Behavioral: Community Health Worker home visits
Community health workers will educate diabetes patients and families about need for regular medical care, taking medications, increasing exercise patterns, improving diet, keeping medical referral exams for specialty.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Time Frame
glycosolated hemoglobin (HbA1c) levels
Time Frame: one year
one year

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Time Frame
Blood pressure
Time Frame: one year
one year
serum lipid levels
Time Frame: one year
one year
abdominal circumference
Time Frame: one year
one year
changes in exericse patterns
Time Frame: one year
one year
changes in dietary intake
Time Frame: one year
one year
keeping scheduled medical appointments
Time Frame: one year
one year
keeping specialty referral for medical exams
Time Frame: one year
one year

Collaborators and Investigators

This is where you will find people and organizations involved with this study.

Sponsor

National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK)

Collaborators

Brown University
The Miriam Hospital
Tafuna Family Health Center

Investigators

  • Principal Investigator: Stephen T McGarvey, PhD, MPH, Brown University, Providence, RI, USA

Publications and helpful links

The person responsible for entering information about the study voluntarily provides these publications. These may be about anything related to the study.

General Publications

Study record dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Major Dates

Study Start

October 1, 2007

Primary Completion (Actual)

June 1, 2011

Study Completion (Actual)

July 1, 2013

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

February 23, 2009

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

February 23, 2009

First Posted (Estimate)

February 25, 2009

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Estimate)

October 7, 2015

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

October 5, 2015

Last Verified

October 1, 2015

More Information

Terms related to this study

Keywords

Additional Relevant MeSH Terms

Other Study ID Numbers

  • R18 DK075371-DCAS
  • NIH Grant R18-DK075371

This information was retrieved directly from the website clinicaltrials.gov without any changes. If you have any requests to change, remove or update your study details, please contact register@clinicaltrials.gov. As soon as a change is implemented on clinicaltrials.gov, this will be updated automatically on our website as well.

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