Clinical Research Directory

K-ORCA: Testing a Decision Support Tool and Group Process for Selecting Interventions

This proposal responds to NIMH Objective 4.2.c to develop "decision-support tools and technologies that increase the effectiveness and continuous improvement of mental health interventions" by leveraging the Family First Prevention Services Act (FFPSA) policy opportunity. First, a web-based platform to host (a) a decision-support tool and (b) automated facilitation for group decisions with the tool will be developed with state partners' feedback. Next, decision makers leading their states' FFPSA quality improvement efforts will be engaged to pilot a decision-support intervention comprised of the tool and live or automated facilitation, and to evaluate the implementation quality of evidence-based programs adopted with the decision-support intervention.

Connecting Today to Combat Social Isolation and Loneliness

The investigators developed Connecting Today, a feasible and highly acceptable remote visiting program that can support care home residents living with moderate to severe dementia to have video calls with their family members, friends, or care partners. The investigators will recruit 80 residents from 4 care homes, and their family members, friends, or care partners. All participants will be offered 60 minutes of Connecting Today per week for 6 weeks (in either the intervention group, or in the wait-list control group). An onsite care provider will be trained to tailor the video calls, and facilitate positive verbal and non-verbal engagement during the calls. The investigators will evaluate how Connecting Today affects outcomes for residents (quality of life, loneliness, and responsive behaviours) and their remote visitors (quality of life, loneliness, and social support). The investigators will assess how outcomes differ for men, women, and people with different perceptions and experiences of Connecting Today.

Families Implementing Good Health Traditions for Life

This study will provide evidence for the utility of using a community-engaged research approach to implement a tailored, family-oriented adaptation of the Diabetes Prevention Program that will have positive effects on risk factors associated with type 2 diabetes morbidity and mortality among Black families in a Southwest Georgia community.

The Effectiveness of AIFIGA Program on Nursing Home Nursing Staff and Family and Residents'Health

This study aims to develop and evaluate the longitudinal effectiveness of the Artificial Intelligence Family Involvement Generative Agent (AIFIGA) program in enhancing the health of nursing staff, family, and residents' health through the use of a sequential, mixed methods research design. The development of a real-time, interactive, and informative AIFIGA program that sparks innovation is necessary to achieve effective communication between families and nursing staff. In Phase I, lasting 18 months, we will develop the AIFIGA program based on triangulate research design, observation and in-depth interview understanding the daily communication experiences and expectations from both families and nursing staff perception in Nursing Homes(NHs) after COVID-19, as well as our previous years' research results. The training data for AIFIGA will be derived from the collection of communication dialogues in these qualitative data. Furthermore, the intelligence of AIFIGA will be developed using publicly available large language models (LLMs). In Phase II, spanning the next 18 months, we will evaluate the longitudinal effects of the AIFIGA program on the health of residents, families, and nursing staff, tracking changes over time (baseline, 1 month, 3 months, and 6 months). There will be two groups of participants: (a) an AIFIGA group that receives the AIFIGA program and uses it for 3 months, and (b) a control group that receives only routine care.

Family-Focused Therapy for Individuals at High Clinical Risk for Psychosis: A Confirmatory Efficacy Trial

The present study is a confirmatory efficacy trial of Family Focused Therapy for youth at clinical high risk for psychosis (FFT-CHR). This trial is sponsored by seven mature CHR clinical research programs from the North American Prodrome Longitudinal Study (NAPLS). The young clinical high risk sample (N = 220 youth ages 13-25) is to be followed at 6-month intervals for 18 months.

Effect of FPCA on Incidence of Emergency Delirium in Children After Surgery

Emergence delirium (ED) stands out as a prevalent postoperative complication among paediatric patients, correlating with extended hospitalization periods, escalated healthcare expenses, and increased incidence of postoperative maladaptive behaviours (POMBs). There is a lack of well-established pharmacological or non-pharmacological interventions demonstrating efficacy in reducing the occurrence of ED. Therefore, our objective is to assess the potential of family-centred perioperative care for anaesthesia (FPCA) in mitigating the incidence of ED in children, compared with routine anaesthesia.

Reporting Back Pesticide Results to Family Child Care Home Directors

Child Care Health Consultants will provide an integrated pest management (IPM) intervention for \~30 family child care home directors. The intervention will include an educational component, collecting carpet dust samples, reporting back the pesticides identified in the carpet, and 7-monthly consultations to identify ways to reduce their exposure to pesticides and lower their long term health risks.

Web-based Support for Family Caregivers of Patients With Advanced Cancer

For family caregivers of patients with advanced cancer, preparedness for caregiving is crucial for maintaining health and quality of life both during care and after the death of the patient. This project contributes to earlier research funded by the Swedish Cancer Society, about an intervention that was delivered by a multi-professional team and proved to be successful in promoting preparedness. However, such interventions are often costly and logistically challenging. In addition, the Covid-19 pandemic has further significantly raised the need for digital alternatives in healthcare. As a possible solution, an evidence-based intervention, narstaende.se, has been developed consisting of recorded videos of conversations between clinicians and family caregivers (actors), linked to informational texts and a moderated chat forum. The intervention was pilot tested during 2020 and 2021, exploring feasibility, content and family caregivers' experiences. As preliminary results are promising, the intervention is taken one step further and tested as a web-based intervention in a larger scale.

SAFIR Family Talk - Investigating the Effect of The Family Talk Intervention

The goal of this clinical trial is to test the effect of the Family Talk Preventive Intervention compared to service as usual for families where a parent has mental illness. Participants are the parent with a mental illness receiving treatment from a secondary mental health service within the last two years from inclusion, their youngest child aged 7-17 years and the other parent of this child. The main questions it aims to answer are: Is Family Talk superior to service as usual regarding improving? * The child's level of functioning * The parent's sense of competence * Family functioning Participants will undergo interviews and fill out questionnaires. Half will be randomized to Family Talk and receive a manualized, family-based intervention of approximately 8 conversations with a trained, Family Talk interventionist. The other half will be randomized to service as usual which is normally two conversations with a professional in the mental health sector. The researchers will compare the two groups on child's level of functioning, parental sense of competence and family functioning.

Childhood Obesity Treatment Designed for Low Income and Hispanic Families

This study is a type-1 hybrid effectiveness-implementation RCT comparing a novel family-inclusive childhood obesity treatment program, the "Healthy Living Program" (HeLP), to a protocol that enhances usual primary care to deliver Recommended Treatment of Obesity in Primary Care (RTOP). Children with obesity and their families will be referred to the study by primary care providers and randomized to HeLP or RTOP. The clinical setting is a practice-based research network serving majority Hispanic and Medicaid-insured populations. The intensive phase and booster sessions of HeLP will take place at recreation centers located near the clinics and will be led by health educators employed by the clinics. Visits with primary care providers (PCPs) for HeLP maintenance or RTOP will occur at the clinics.

Switching Mediterranean Consumers to Mediterranean Sustainable Healthy Dietary Patterns

The population from Mediterranean countries is abandoning the Mediterranean diet (MD) traditional dietary and lifestyle pattern moving to unhealthier habits because of profound cultural and socio-economic driven lifestyle changes. Families, particularly parents, are responsible for structuring children's early experiences with food and eating as well as for transmitting knowledge of the MD. Educational family approaches can not only lead to more solid food literacy and healthy habits for children in the family but can also improve dietary profiles for adults, thus preventing future health-related problems. There is a lack of adequate study protocol for inducing a positive dietary, environmental and lifestyle behaviour in the family setting. SWITCHtoHEALTHY study aims to evaluate the effects of a multi-component nutritional intervention deployed at family level on the adherence to the MD pattern in families from three Mediterranean countries. A parallel, randomized, single blind controlled multicentric nutritional intervention study will be conducted in 480 families with children and adolescents among 3-17 years from Spain, Morocco, and Turkey over 13 months. Specifically, 160 families per country will be enrolled in a multi-component intervention and allocated to use digital interactive tools, hands-on educational materials and activities for adolescents, easy-to-eat healthy plant-based snacks for children, or a combination of two or three of the components. There will also be a control group that will receive general advice on healthy eating. The intervention study is scheduled to begin in November 2023. Through the digital tools the parents will use an interactive App through which they will receive personalized weekly meal plans while the engagement of all the family will be prompted by using a life simulation game. A set of activities for adolescents based on a learning-through-play approach to be carried out within the family and at school will be developed by adolescents and voluntary schoolteachers through co-creation sessions. The innovative and sustainable plant-based snacks will be produced by local food companies and introduced in the children dietary plan as healthy alternatives for between meals. By using a full-factorial design, the independent and combined effects of each intervention component will be tested by comparing the 7 intervention groups with the control group.

ARTLifeLine: Assisted Reproduction Technology (ART) Family Health and Development Trajectory Cohort (ARTLL)

The goal of this observational study is to study the health status of infertile couples and their offspring using assisted reproductive technologies. The main questions it aims to answer are: 1. On the basis of the assisted reproduction birth cohort and related research established by the team in the early stage, further expand the construction of the "tracking cohort of familial health and development using assisted reproduction", combine emerging technologies such as cross-database linking and integration, multi-omics sequencing and classical cohort research design, and carry out long-term longitudinal follow-up across generations, covering the whole life cycle and health in multi-dimension. 2. Build a disease risk prediction model for pregnant women and children with assisted reproduction. 3. Delineate the growth curve and neurobehavioral development trajectory of assisted reproductive offspring at different stages. 4. Evaluate the adolescent fertility potential and risk factors of assisted reproductive offspring.

Family Involvement in ICU

The aim of this prospective cohort study was to investigate the effect of the time spent with relatives of patients treated in a tertiary intensive care unit on patient outcomes. The main question it aimed to answer was: Does spending more time with relatives of patients in intensive care result in lower sedative agent requirements? Does spending more time with relatives of patients in intensive care result in less delirium, fewer ventilator days, and shorter ICU stays?

Caregivers' eCourse for Recovery After Hip Fracture

In this two part study, we will seek 1. general feedback on the feasibility of an online education and skill development program for family/caregivers of older adults recovering from a surgically repaired low-trauma hip fracture. We will also 2. test its feasibility and acceptability with family caregivers.

Family Centred Healthcare - Zero Separation and Couplet Care

Today mother and infant are routinely separated directly after birth if there is a need of specialised treatment and care, despite of the significant and positive effects of skin-to-skin contact. Thus, there is a need of change in organizing the treatment and care in a way that minimizes separation. The aim is to evaluate the implementation and effect of a complex family-centred intervention based 107 on zero separation and couplet care. The intervention is rooted in the philosophy of family-centred care. Essentially, mother infant dyads will be admitted together, where they will receive couplet care by neonatal nurses. The study comprises a quasi-experimental trial and a qualitative process evaluation including a field study and two interview studies. Finally, a health economic evaluation will be conducted to assess the cost-effectiveness of this complex intervention. The intervention will take place at the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at Hvidovre Hospital. The nurses will as a part of the intervention be educated to take care of both mother and infant and carry out the intervention. Five families with experiences from the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit and the Maternity Unit participates as patient and public representative in the project, as their experiences and ideas will provide an added value to the project. This study contribute with a new perspective on how to organize the treatment and care of a newborn family in a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. The study will be the first to examine zero separation and couplet care within sick mother-infant dyads. The study will provide knowledge about how an intervention consisting of zero separation and couplet care can be feasible and acceptable, and what kind of effect and impact it will provide. It is expected that the study as a whole may impact and profile clinical nursing, as well as benefitting public health.

Danish Diabetes Birth Registry 2

Pregnancies in women with pre-existing diabetes are considered "high risk" pregnancies, poses daily clinical challenges and in terms of research - a number of unanswered questions. Therefore, the investigators wish to establish a nationwide cohort of pregnancies complicated by pre-existing diabetes - the Danish Diabetes Birth Registry (DDBR2) The DDBR2 registry comprises all types of pre-existing diabetes including T1D, T2D and other types (as MODY), generating a nationwide cohort of mother/partner/children trios with accessible registry-, clinical data and biological biobank samples. This will enable the investigators to use data longitudinally to examine short- and long-term outcomes of pregnancies in women with diabetes.

Efficacy of the Use of Diaries in Intensive Care Units

Randomized clinical trial that aims to evaluate the impact of the use of a diary in patients and relatives of patients admitted to an ICU in relation to usual practice in terms of health-related quality of life, the post-traumatic stress and anxiety/depression at 2, 6 and 12 months after ICU discharge.