Social Prescribing for a Mindful Lifestyle

June 21, 2026 updated by: Buddhist Tzu Chi General Hospital

The goal of this clinical trial is to evaluate the effectiveness of an 8-week mindfulness lifestyle social prescribing program in community-dwelling older adults aged 55 and older. The main questions it aims to answer are:

To establish a mindfulness lifestyle social prescribing model applied to the psychological and social health promotion of middle-aged and older populations.

To evaluate the effectiveness of the intervention on improving depressive symptoms, loneliness, and quality of life in this population.

Participants will receive an 8-week group intervention program, with each weekly session lasting approximately 3 hours. The structured curriculum integrates mindfulness awareness, body scanning, mindfulness stretching, breathing training, healthy dietary education, and art practices (such as herbal therapy and leaf printing). Researchers will collect and evaluate data from pre- and post-intervention assessments to measure changes in depressive symptoms, loneliness risk, and overall quality of life.

Study Overview

Status

Not yet recruiting

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Detailed Description

This clinical trial implements an 8-week mindfulness lifestyle social prescribing program designed to enhance the psychological and social well-being of community-dwelling older adults. The intervention integrates mindfulness practices with healthy lifestyle modifications to address sub-healthy states, such as depressive symptoms and social isolation, which traditional clinical models often fail to fully resolve.

The structured 8-week group curriculum meets weekly for 3 hours per session. The program systematically incorporates mindfulness awareness, body scanning, mindfulness stretching, breathing training, healthy dietary education, and art practices (including herbal therapy and leaf printing).

The program is delivered by a multidisciplinary team of geriatricians, geriatric case managers, nutritionists, exercise instructors, and trained volunteers to ensure comprehensive support.

Research procedures involve a pre- and post-intervention assessment design. Participants will undergo standardized evaluations before the commencement of the first session (Week 1) and upon the completion of the program (Week 8). These assessments will objectively measure changes in depressive symptoms, the risk of loneliness, and overall quality of life to determine the effect of this social prescribing model.

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Estimated)

50

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 Contact

Study Locations

  • Taiwan
    • Taiwan
      • Hualien City, Taiwan, Taiwan, 97071
        • Buddhist Tzu Chi General Hospital
        • 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

  • Adult
  • Older Adult

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

No

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • People aged 55 years or older.
  • People with a Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS-15) score of 7-10 or a UCLA Loneliness Scale Version 3 score of 35-64.
  • People can understand the research process, meet the requirements of the research, and can sign the informed consent and participate in the project.

Exclusion Criteria:

  • People that are unable to cooperate with the project or follow-up.
  • According to the PI's judgment, people with severe or poorly controlled conditions include ongoing acute diseases, severe infections, severe abnormal laboratory tests, or serious medical conditions with the following systems: cardiovascular, pulmonary, hepatic, nervous, mental, metabolic, renal, musculoskeletal, gastrointestinal, etc.
  • People with severe depression, risk of self-harm, severe cognitive impairment (dementia), visual or hearing impairment, and disabilities that prevent the completion of the project and assessment.
  • People are currently or expected to join any other physical training courses or nutrition intervention plans during the project period.
  • Others are based on the judgment of the PI that participating in this project may adversely affect the safety of the subjects, hinder the progress of the experiment, or interfere with the evaluation of the outcomes of the project.

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: Health Services Research
  • Allocation: N/A
  • Interventional Model: Single Group Assignment
  • Masking: None (Open Label)

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: Experimental Arm
Behavioral: Mindfulness Lifestyle Social Prescribing Program
An 8-week, once-weekly, 3-hour group program designed for middle-aged and older adults. The structured curriculum integrates mindfulness awareness, body scanning, mindfulness stretching, breathing training, healthy dietary education, and art practices (such as herbal therapy and leaf printing). It is delivered by a multidisciplinary team including geriatricians, case managers, dietitians, exercise instructors, and volunteers.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Changes in Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS-15) score
Time Frame: Baseline and Week 8
The Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS-15) is a 15-item questionnaire used to assess depression symptoms in older adults. Scores range from 0 to 15, with higher scores indicating more severe depressive symptoms.
Baseline and Week 8
Changes in UCLA Loneliness Scale score
Time Frame: Baseline and Week 8
The UCLA Loneliness Scale measures an individual's subjective feelings of loneliness and social isolation. Scores range from 20 to 80, with higher scores indicating greater loneliness.
Baseline and Week 8
Changes in WHOQOL-BREF questionnaire score
Time Frame: Baseline and Week 8
The World Health Organization Quality of Life-BREF (WHOQOL-BREF) Taiwan version is a 28-item questionnaire used to assess the physical, psychological, social relationships, and environment domains of quality of life. Scores for each domain are transformed to a scale of 4 to 20, with higher scores indicating better quality of life. Changes in scores were evaluated between baseline and week 8.
Baseline and Week 8

Collaborators and Investigators

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

Sponsor

Buddhist Tzu Chi General Hospital

Investigators

  • Principal Investigator: Sheng-Lun Kao, MD. PhD., Buddhist Tzu Chi General Hospital

Publications and helpful links

The person responsible for entering information about the study voluntarily provides these publications. These may be about anything related to the study.

General Publications

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 (Estimated)

July 1, 2026

Primary Completion (Estimated)

December 31, 2028

Study Completion (Estimated)

December 31, 2028

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

June 21, 2026

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

June 21, 2026

First Posted (Actual)

June 25, 2026

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Actual)

June 25, 2026

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

June 21, 2026

Last Verified

June 1, 2026

More Information

Terms related to this study

Keywords

Additional Relevant MeSH Terms

Other Study ID Numbers

  • IRB115-107-A

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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