Mobile Message Intervention for Stroke Caregivers' Psychological Support

October 27, 2019 updated by: Dr. Jung-Jae Lee, The University of Hong Kong

The Effect of an Ecological Momentary Intervention for Stroke Caregivers' Psychological Support: a Pilot Feasibility Trial

The proposed trial aims to test the feasibility of ecological momentary intervention on stroke caregivers' psychological distress.

Study Overview

Status

Unknown

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Detailed Description

75% of stroke caregivers report severe caregiver burdens, with 60% of stroke caregivers reporting at least one depressive symptom in Hong Kong. However, caregivers can experience difficulties in accessing and fully utilising existing services due to the varying types of care needs and its intensities amongst stroke survivors.

Ecological momentary intervention (EMI) as an innovative and personalised intervention has shown great potential in supporting psychological well-being; yet, there are no studies on using EMI for the caregivers' psychological support. The proposed trial aims to reduce stroke caregivers' psychological distress by delivering EMI through instant messaging applications to provide personalised and real-time support led by healthcare professionals.

Stroke caregivers screened by Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9) with scores ranging from 5 to 19 will be recruited from multiple sites including community centres, rehabilitation centres and outpatient clinics in public hospitals in Hong Kong, and individually randomised into the intervention group (n=20) or control group (n=20). The intervention group will receive the personalised instant messages for 4 weeks. The control group will receive general health information and regular messages reminding them to participate in follow-up surveys. The primary outcome will be the score of PHQ-9 at 4 weeks. Secondary outcomes will include anxiety, perceived stress, and caregiver burden.

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Anticipated)

40

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

  • Hong Kong
      • Hong Kong, Hong Kong
        • Recruiting
        • Hong Kong PHAB Association
        • Contact:
      • Hong Kong, Hong Kong
        • Recruiting
        • Hong Kong Stroke Association
        • Contact:

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

No

Genders Eligible for Study

All

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • Primary family caregiver of stroke survivor
  • Able to read and communicate in Chinese
  • Able to use mobile phone text messaging function
  • PHQ-9 ranged from 5 to 19

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Professional medical personnel and care assistants
  • Has provided care for <1 month prior to recruitment
  • Has diagnosis of psychiatric disease or is currently taking psychotropic drug
  • PHQ-9 ≥ 20 (i.e., severe depressive symptom)
  • Currently participating in any type of psychological support intervention

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: Other
  • Allocation: Randomized
  • Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
  • Masking: Double

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Active Comparator: Intervention group
receive mobile messages supporting caregivers' psychological well-being, according to the participants' preferences in intervention group.
Other: Ecological Momentary Intervention (EMI)
Using the messaging function of mobile devices, EMI offers a framework to deliver health information to the target population, corresponding to each individual's demands in terms of type (e.g., photo, text and/or voice message), timing, duration, and frequency of the messages, which are different to the features from other interventions
No Intervention: Control group
receive general health information through a mobile message.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Change depressive symptoms by Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9) Scale (questionnaire) at 4 weeks
Time Frame: 4 weeks
Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9) Scale: PHQ-9 is a scale for screening depression in primary care. It consists of 9 items with 4 likert scale. Score range is from 0 to 27 (higher score = higher severity of depressive symptom).
4 weeks

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Change anxiety symptoms by Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7 (GAD-7) Scale at 4 weeks
Time Frame: 4 weeks

Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7 (GAD-7) Scale: GAD-7 is a scale for screening anxiety in primary care. It consists of 7 items with 4 likert scale.

Score range is from 0 to 21 (higher score = higher severity of anxiety symptom).
4 weeks
Change stress levels by Perceived Stress Scale (PSS-4) at 4 weeks
Time Frame: 4 weeks
Perceived Stress Scale (PSS-4); PSS-4 is a scale for screening stress level. It consists of 4 items with 5 likert scale. Score range is from 0 to 16 (higher score = higher severity of stress).
4 weeks
Change caring burdens by Burden Interview-4 (ZBI-4) at 4 weeks
Time Frame: 4 weeks

Burden Interview-4 (ZBI-4) Scale: ZBI-4 is a scale for screening carer's burdens. It consists of 4 items with 5 likert scale.

Score range is from 0 to 16 (higher score = higher severity of caring burden).
4 weeks

Collaborators and Investigators

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

Sponsor

The University of Hong Kong

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)

October 1, 2019

Primary Completion (Anticipated)

October 30, 2019

Study Completion (Anticipated)

January 31, 2020

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

October 24, 2019

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

October 27, 2019

First Posted (Actual)

October 29, 2019

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Actual)

October 29, 2019

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

October 27, 2019

Last Verified

October 1, 2019

More Information

Terms related to this study

Additional Relevant MeSH Terms

Other Study ID Numbers

  • HKUSON_LEE1

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.

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