Delivering Church-based Interventions to Reduce Stigma and Mental Health Treatment Disparities Among Latinos

June 6, 2025 updated by: Eunice Wong, RAND
This study is a cluster randomized controlled trial of a Latino church-based intervention in Los Angeles and Riverside Counties. This study aims to leverage the collective resources of Latino religious congregations and the National Alliance on Mental Illness to test the effectiveness of a multi-component intervention directed at reducing stigma, increasing mental health literacy, and improving access to mental health services.

Study Overview

Status

Active, not recruiting

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Detailed Description

This study is a cluster randomized controlled trial of a Latino church-based intervention in Los Angeles and Riverside Counties. This study aims to leverage the collective resources of Latino religious congregations and the National Alliance on Mental Illness to test the effectiveness of a multi-component intervention directed at reducing stigma, increasing mental health literacy, and improving access to mental health services. A total of 12 churches (6 intervention and 6 wait-list control) will be enrolled in the study. Churches within each study site, the Riverside County parishes and the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, will be matched in pairs based on size and geography. Three matched pairs from each study site will be randomly selected and then randomly assigned within each pair to intervention or control. The planned study will involve 2400 participants (1200 intervention and 1200 control) who will be part of congregations that are randomly assigned to receive the church-based intervention immediately or a wait list control condition. Participants will be assessed at baseline, 6-month follow-up, and 12-month follow-up to evaluate intervention effects on mental health service use and potential mediators (i.e., mental health literacy, stigma).

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Actual)

1713

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

  • United States
    • California
      • Santa Monica, California, United States, 90401
        • RAND

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

18 years and older (Adult, Older Adult)

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • Congregant of selected intervention and control churches

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Does not meet criteria above

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: Supportive Care
  • Allocation: Randomized
  • Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
  • Masking: None (Open Label)

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: NAMI Mental Health 101 and NAMI FaithNet
Mental Health 101 and FaithNet
Behavioral: NAMI Mental Health 101 and NAMI FaithNet

Congregants of Intervention Churches will receive:

  1. NAMI Mental Health 101, a 60-90 minute, contact-based educational intervention
  2. NAMI FaithNet which consists of congregational support and training to cultivate supportive environments within faith communities for those with mental health conditions and their families.
No Intervention: Wait-list Control
After the 12-month follow-up, wait-list control churches will be provided with the opportunity to receive Mental Health 101 and NAMI FaithNet interventions.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Mental Health Service Use
Time Frame: Mental Health Service Use between Baseline and 12-month Follow-up

Change in mental health service use among participants in intervention churches versus those in control churches.

Mental health service use will be measured with the following modified item from the California Health Interview Survey: "In the past 12 months have you seen a professional, such as a counselor, psychiatrist, or social worker for problems with your mental health, emotions, nerves, or your use of alcohol or drugs?"

Response options are dichotomous (Yes/No).

Tran LD, Ponce NA. Who Gets Needed Mental Health Care? Use of Mental Health Services among Adults with Mental Health Need in California. Calif J Health

Promot. 2017;15(1):36-45. PubMed PMID: 28729814; PubMed Central PMCID:

PMC5515380.
Mental Health Service Use between Baseline and 12-month Follow-up

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Mental Illness Stigma
Time Frame: Mental Illness Stigma reduction between Baseline and 12-month Follow-up

Change in stigma among participants in intervention churches versus those in control churches. Personal stigma will be assessed with social distance measures, one of the most widely used indicators of stigma. Social distance is assessed by asking respondents to rate their degree of willingness to interact with someone with a mental illness in various interpersonal situations (e.g., work closely on a job; live next door; spend an evening socializing; marry into the family; as a friend).

Jorm AF, Oh E. Desire for social distance from people with mental disorders. The Australian and New Zealand journal of psychiatry. 2009;43(3):183-200.
Mental Illness Stigma reduction between Baseline and 12-month Follow-up

Collaborators and Investigators

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

Sponsor

RAND

Collaborators

National Alliance on Mental Illness California

Investigators

  • Principal Investigator: Eunice C Wong, RAND

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 (Actual)

February 9, 2020

Primary Completion (Estimated)

December 31, 2025

Study Completion (Estimated)

December 31, 2025

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

August 2, 2018

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

August 13, 2018

First Posted (Actual)

August 15, 2018

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Actual)

June 11, 2025

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

June 6, 2025

Last Verified

June 1, 2025

More Information

Terms related to this study

Keywords

Other Study ID Numbers

  • R01MD012638 (U.S. NIH Grant/Contract)

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?

NO

Drug and device information, study documents

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product

No

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product

No

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.

Clinical Trials on Stigma, Social

Clinical Trials on NAMI Mental Health 101 and NAMI FaithNet

Search Similar Trials

Sponsors and Collaborators

Medical Conditions

Drug Interventions

CROs by country

CROs in Papua New Guinea

Conditions

Rare Diseases

Drug Interventions

Dietary Supplements

Sponsor/Collaborators

Locations

Subscribe