CAMS-RAS: for Suicide Prevention (CAMS-RAS)

CAMS Relational Agent System for Suicide Prevention

This Phase I feasibility study endeavors to create a prototype of a tool to determine its feasibility with suicidal patients in emergency departments (EDs). This is not a clinical trial. The overarching goal of this research is to create a tool that could reduce suicide rates, increase delivery of efficacious suicide interventions, and decrease overall costs associated with suicidal behaviors. SBIR Phase I project aims include: (1) creating an advisory board to guide the development of CAMS-RAS; (2) iteratively design and develop relational agent ("Dr. Dave") modeled after the gestures, expressions, and mannerisms of CAMS treatment developer, David Jobes, PhD; and (3) conduct feasibility tests to determine whether CAMS-RAS is acceptable, easy to use, and liked by target end-users: acutely suicidal patients admitted to hospital EDs, psychiatric inpatient units, and medical floors for treatment of injuries sustained during a suicide attempt; hospital medical personnel, administrators, and other stakeholders including peer advocates; and outpatient suicidal patients, clinicians and administrators.

Study Overview

• Status: Completed
• Conditions: Suicide
• Intervention / Treatment: Device: CAMS-RAS

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Actual): 26
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• United States
  • Washington
    • Seattle, Washington, United States, 98144
      • Evidence-Based Practice Institute

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: 18 years and older (Adult, Older Adult)
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No
• Genders Eligible for Study: All

Description

Patient Inclusion Criteria:

• English fluency
• 18 years or older
• receiving clinical care in a hospital or outpatient clinic for suicidality
• Suicidal patients currently admitted to EDs, psychiatric inpatient units, and medical floors, or patient with past (last 6 months) suicidality receiving outpatient treatment

Patient Exclusion Criteria:

• Acutely psychotic
• severely agitated (as determined by care team)

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Prevention
• Allocation: N/A
• Interventional Model: Single Group Assignment
• Masking: None (Open Label)

Number of Arms

1

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: CAMS-RAS; In this single-arm study design, all enrolled patient participants are asked to provide feedback on the CAMS-RAS prototype as it is developed for this study. Feedback will be gathered via survey measure and interview.	Device: CAMS-RAS

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Usability Satisfaction and Acceptability Questionnaire (USAQ)	A brief face-valid, self-report measure that the PI derived from the System Usability Scale and has been successfully used in previous studies. Items are rated on a 5-point Likert Scale (1=poor; 3=good; 5=excellent). Includes open-ended questions to better understand what was most and least helpful with respect to each category and also measures users' acceptance.	up to one day
Number of ED Patient Participants Who Completed Semi-Structured Interview	A semi-structured interview was conducted following use of the CAMS-RAS tool to assess users' likes, dislikes, and other preferences. Questions included: "What were your experiences in using 'Dr. Dave' and the CAMS-RAS system?" and "What suggestions would you have for improvement?" All subjects indicated that they found the tool helpful to them. They described the tool using adjectives similar to those used to describe "Nurse Louise" - a "discharge nurse" avatar on which the investigator's avatar was based: "He's kind and asks me really practical, helpful questions"; "He speaks to me directly in a compassionate way"; and "He is kind and invested".	After interacting with the technology (length: approximately 1 hour), subjects were then asked to complete the semi-structured interview conducted by the research assistant. On average, the interview lasted approximately 15 minutes.

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: Evidence-Based Practice Institute, Seattle, WA
• Collaborators: University of Florida; The Catholic University of America
• Investigators: Principal Investigator: Linda Dimeff, PhD, Evidence-Based Practice Institute

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Actual): December 18, 2015
• Primary Completion (Actual): December 17, 2017
• Study Completion (Actual): December 17, 2017

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: February 23, 2017
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: March 2, 2017
• First Posted (Actual): March 7, 2017

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): July 31, 2018
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: July 2, 2018
• Last Verified: July 1, 2018

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Keywords: Suicidality; Suicide Prevention; Technology; Collaborative Assessment and Management of Suicidality; Suicide Intervention
• Additional Relevant MeSH Terms: Behavioral Symptoms; Self-Injurious Behavior; Suicide
• Other Study ID Numbers: 1R43MH108222-01A1 (U.S. NIH Grant/Contract)

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: YES
• IPD Plan Description: Requests for use of data will be considered on a case-by-case basis. Interested researchers may send data requests to research@ebpi.org.

Drug and device information, study documents

• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product: No
• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product: No