Mobile Health Intervention for Active Tuberculosis

Interactive Mobile Health Intervention to Support Patients With Active Tuberculosis

The purpose of this study is to evaluate and further refine a mobile support tool for patients receiving treatment for active tuberculosis. Half of participants will receive support and monitoring using a mobile phone software application and usual care, while the other half will receive usual care.

Study Overview

• Status: Completed
• Conditions: Tuberculosis; Adherence, Medication
• Intervention / Treatment: Behavioral: Mobile phone TB treatment support app plus usual care; Other: Usual care

Detailed Description

Tuberculosis (TB) remains a top ten leading cause of death globally despite it being a largely curable disease. New effective treatment supervision strategies are needed particularly in low-resource high TB burden settings and a potential solution is in the hands of nearly every patient - a mobile phone. Modern modular design mobile phone software applications ("apps") hold great promise to address this unmet need.

Current technologies allows for rapid design modification based on end user needs, implementation of native operating system (e.g., Android) versions for users with inconsistent internet access, and the integration of the patients' experiences with electronic health records using industry standards. Apps can perform multiple functions (e.g., automated reminders, symptom tracking, secure messaging, multi-media education). To date, few TB related apps have focused on patients as users, and none support patient engagement in self-management of their care or direct adherence monitoring. The research objectives are to understand end user needs and other stakeholder needs to build, refine, and pilot test an app to support patients self-administering treatment for active TB.

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Actual): 42
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• Argentina
  • Province Of Buenos Aires
    • Vicente López, Province Of Buenos Aires, Argentina, 1602
      • Hospital Dr. Antonio A. Cetrángolo

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

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

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• Subject is starting TB treatment for the first time
• Subject has no known TB drug resistance
• Subject is HIV negative (self-reported or documented)
• Subject owns or has regular access to a mobile phone that can access the Internet and is able to operate the mobile phone to communicate or have someone able to assist.

Exclusion Criteria:

• Severely ill (i.e., requiring hospitalization)
• Reside in the same household with another study participant
• History of known drug resistance and HIV co-infection because their care is managed separately and the treatment regimens and duration differ.

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Health Services Research
• Allocation: Randomized
• Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
• Masking: Single

Number of Arms

2

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: Mobile phone TB treatment support app; Daily use of the mobile phone TB treatment support app plus usual care. Participants will be asked to self-report daily TB medication administration, side-effects when applicable, and complete the direct adherence paper-based test randomly on 3-4 days of the week during the intensive treatment phase (first two months) and then 1-2 times per week during the maintenance phase (about month 3-6).	Behavioral: Mobile phone TB treatment support app plus usual care; The behavioral intervention is delivered through a mobile phone TB support app. The functions allow the participant to: self-report daily administration of their TB medication, self-report side effects if applicable, review educational material on TB disease and its treatment, complete a treatment adherence monitoring test (urine drug metabolite test), take notes, and review their treatment progress/report. The drug metabolite test will require that the participant place a small amount of urine on the end of the paper strip, wait for results, and take a picture of the paper using the app. The purpose of this test is to confirm that medication was correctly taken within the past 24 hours.; Other: Usual care; Usual care consists of outpatient treatment management from the time of diagnosis (unless symptoms are severe and hospitalization is recommended), routine clinical and laboratory tests, and follow-up appointments determined by the clinician. In general, patients receive 1-2 month's supply of medication and are asked to return monthly for follow-up.
Active Comparator: Usual care; Usual care consists of outpatient treatment management from the time of diagnosis (unless symptoms are severe and hospitalization is recommended), routine clinical and laboratory tests, and follow-up appointments determined by the clinician. In general, patients receive 1-2 month's supply of medication and are asked to return monthly for follow-up.	Other: Usual care; Usual care consists of outpatient treatment management from the time of diagnosis (unless symptoms are severe and hospitalization is recommended), routine clinical and laboratory tests, and follow-up appointments determined by the clinician. In general, patients receive 1-2 month's supply of medication and are asked to return monthly for follow-up.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Number of Participants With Treatment Success	Treatment outcomes will be measured using standard definitions set by the World Health Organization (WHO) Standards of TB treatment. Treatment success based on WHO definitions: completed (without bacteriological confirmation) or cured (negative sputum smear at 6 months and at least once prior to 6 months)). Other treatment outcomes include: failed (sputum smear positive at 5 months or later), died, defaulted (treatment interruption for ≥ 2 months), lost to follow-up (diagnosed, treatment outcome not documented), or transferred out (transferred to another reporting unit and treatment outcome is unknown).	6 months

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Engagement: Average Number of Days Participants Reported Through the App	Level of engagement using the app measured by the average number of days reporting treatment adherence over 180 days of treatment.	6 months

Other Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Feasibility of Implementation	number of participants with access to a phone and internet connection	6 months

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: University of Washington
• Collaborators: National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR)
• Investigators: Principal Investigator: Sarah Iribarren, PhD, RN, University of Washington

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Actual): April 9, 2019
• Primary Completion (Actual): March 31, 2020
• Study Completion (Actual): July 31, 2020

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: May 21, 2018
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: May 21, 2018
• First Posted (Actual): June 1, 2018

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Estimated): March 26, 2025
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: March 11, 2025
• Last Verified: March 1, 2025

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Keywords: mobile Health
• Additional Relevant MeSH Terms: Infections; Gram-Positive Bacterial Infections; Bacterial Infections; Bacterial Infections and Mycoses; Actinomycetales Infections; Mycobacterium Infections; Tuberculosis
• Other Study ID Numbers: STUDY00002080; K23NR017210 (U.S. NIH Grant/Contract)

Drug and device information, study documents

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