Optimization and Testing of ALRITE, a Clinical Decision Support Tool for Management of Respiratory Illnesses in Young Children in Primary Care Health Facilities in Uganda

The goal of this study is to pilot test the feasibility of a mobile health clinical decision support tool called ALRITE for the diagnosis and management of acute lower respiratory illnesses in young children in Uganda. Asthma/wheezing illness, in particular, is underdiagnosed in this setting. The main questions the study aims to answer are:

• Are the intervention structure, processes, outcomes, and implementations strategies feasible to conduct in the desired settings?
• Does ALRITE increase the diagnosis of wheezing illness among children seen at Ugandan health centers?

Researchers will compare outcomes before and after ALRITE deployment to healthcare workers at 4 Ugandan healthcare centers using an interrupted time series design. Study participants are healthcare workers.

There will be12 months of baseline data collection ("baseline period"), at the beginning of which healthcare workers will be enrolled at each site. Following the baseline period, health workers will receive ALRITE training and will be encouraged but not required to use ALRITE in clinical care for a 6-month intervention period. Health worker participants will fill out surveys and participate in focus group discussions to provide feedback.

Study Overview

• Status: Not yet recruiting
• Conditions: Childhood Asthma; Pneumonia Childhood; Wheezing Lower Respiratory Illness; Acute Lower Respiratory Illness
• Intervention / Treatment: Other: ALRITE

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Estimated): 48
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

• Study Contact: Name: Jane Edelson; Phone Number: 206-779-9351; Email: jedelson@uw.edu

Study Locations

• Uganda
  • Kampala, Uganda
    • Makerere University Lung Institute
    • Contact: Rebecca Nantanda, MBChB, PhD, MMed; Phone Number: 0777-723332; Email: rnantanda@gmail.com

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: Adult; Older Adult
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• Healthcare workers employed at each study site with a minimum of 6 months' experience of caring for children with respiratory symptoms in general outpatient care
• Completed one of the following training programs: medical officer, clinical officer, nurse, midwife
• proficient in reading and speaking English, one of the official languages of Uganda
• at least 18 years of age

Exclusion Criteria:

• inability to read/write English

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Health Services Research
• 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: ALRITE deployment; Healthcare workers will undergo training in the mobile health decision support tool called ALRITE. They will each receive an ALRITE-enabled tablet to use in clinical care. ALRITE use is encouraged but not required. Researchers will collect clinical data from the health record at each study site to evaluate the effect of the ALRITE intervention on acute lower respiratory illness diagnosis and treatment.

Other: ALRITE; ALRITE is a point-of-care mobile health clinical decision support tool designed for use by healthcare workers in Uganda. ALRITE guides the user into entering patient information and provides guideline-concordant recommendations. ALRITE also includes educational videos and weight-based dosing.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Healthcare worker enrollment (study feasibility)	Number of healthcare workers enrolled during the baseline phase and additional healthcare workers who were enrolled during the remaining study period (ex: new hires or transfers)	At enrollment
Healthcare worker retention (study feasibility)	Proportion of healthcare workers active in the study over total number enrolled	From enrollment through study completion, an average of 20 months
Availability of ALRITE-enabled devices (study feasibility)	Proportion of functional devices over number of devices provided to the facility per month	Monthly during the intervention period from ALRITE deployment through study completion, an average of 6 months
ALRITE training completion (study feasibility)	Number of ALRITE training sessions completed per site	During ALRITE deployment at the end of the baseline period, estimated 1-2 months
Data completeness (study feasibility)	Percentage of eligible pediatric cases correctly abstracted from the health facility records into the electronic database.	Monthly from baseline (day 1) through the study completion, estimated 20 months

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Diagnosis rate of wheezing illness	Diagnosis rates of wheezing illness/asthma among all young children presenting to study sites, as recorded in the health record	Monthly from baseline through study completion, estimated 20 months
Diagnosis rate of pneumonia	Diagnosis rates of pneumonia among all young children presenting to study sites, as recorded in the health record	Monthly from baseline through study completion, estimated 20 months

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: University of Washington
• Collaborators: National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI)
• Investigators: Principal Investigator: Laura Ellington, MD, MS, University of Washington

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Estimated): February 1, 2026
• Primary Completion (Estimated): October 31, 2027
• Study Completion (Estimated): November 30, 2027

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: January 21, 2026
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: January 23, 2026
• First Posted (Actual): January 27, 2026

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): January 27, 2026
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: January 23, 2026
• Last Verified: January 1, 2026

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Other Study ID Numbers: STUDY00020447; 5K23HL163321-02 (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