Multimedia Based Information to Parents in a Pediatric Acute Ward: A Randomized Controlled Trial

Study Overview
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Brief Summary
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The aim of this study is to determine whether multimedia based health information presented in a pediatric acute ward to parents of children with breathing difficulties due to lower respiratory tract infections, is more effective than verbal information to reduce the parent's anxiety and to increase satisfaction with nursing care and health information.

Detailed Description
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The intervention website www.syktbarn.no is an open Norwegian online resource for parents of small children, and the site contains videos, audio clips, animations, illustrations, pictures and text materials regarding children's illnesses and normal development. In addition, the parents can use an interactive symptom checker that will help them to decide what to do and when to seek medical advice when their child is sick. The uniqueness of the website is the authentic video clips of sick children with common childhood symptoms like breathing difficulties, signs of dehydration, rash, cough and fever.

Official Title
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Multimedia Based Information to Parents in a Pediatric Acute Ward: A Randomized Controlled Trial

Conditions
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Health Communication

Intervention / Treatment
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* Behavioral: Multimedia information
* Behavioral: verbal information


Participation Criteria
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Eligibility Criteria
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Inclusion Criteria: parents of 0-15 years old children with breathing difficulties caused by LRTI (bronchiolitis, laryngitis or pneumonia) or asthma exacerbation ability to communicate and read Norwegian Exclusion Criteria: parents of children with chronic diseases who have direct access to the acute ward, children with oxygen saturation less than 90 %, or other very sick children who need urgent treatment

Ages Eligible for Study
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Minimum Age: 10 Years
Maximum Age: 105 Years

Sexes Eligible for Study
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All

Accepts Healthy Volunteers
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No

Study Plan
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How is the study designed?
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Design Details

Primary Purpose: Health Services Research
Allocation: Randomized
Intervention Model: Parallel Assignment
Masking: None (Open Label)


Arms and Interventions

| Participant Group/Arm | Intervention/Treatment |
| --- | --- |
| Experimental: multimedia information<br>Health information concerning the child's diagnosis, treatment and recovery time after evaluation by the pediatrician, using a 15 minutes long standardized health information package with multimedia elements from the Norwegian website www.syktbarn.no (English version: www.childhealthguide.com) | Behavioral: Multimedia information<br> <br> |
| Active Comparator: verbal information<br>Verbal health information by a nurse in the acute ward concerning the child's diagnosis, treatment and recovery time, after the evaluation by the pediatrician | Behavioral: verbal information<br> <br> |

What is the study measuring?
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Primary Outcome Measures

| Outcome Measure | Measure Description | Time Frame |
| --- | --- | --- |
| parental anxiety | evaluated with the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI) (translated to Norwegian) | at discharge from the acute ward. An average stay in the acute ward is about 5 hours. | 

Secondary Outcome Measures

| Outcome Measure | Measure Description | Time Frame |
| --- | --- | --- |
| parental satisfaction with nursing care | evaluated with the Consumer Emergency Care Satisfaction Scale (CECSS) | at discharge from the acute ward. An average stay in the acute ward is about 5 hours. | 
| Parental satisfaction with the health information given in the acute ward. | Evaluated with a structured telephone interview 1-2 weeks after hospital discharge, performed by the main researcher. | 1-2 weeks after discharge from the hospital. An average stay in the acute ward is about 5 hours, and an average stay in the children's department is 2 days. | 

 Terms related to the study
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Keywords Provided by Centre Hospitalier Valida
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Parents, Caregivers, Anxiety, Consumer satisfaction