Clinical trial NCT06417762: Dime La VerDAD: Verify, Debunk, and Disseminate
Official title: Dime La VerDAD: Verify, Debunk, and Disseminate
Study type: INTERVENTIONAL
Overall status: RECRUITING
Phase: NA
Conditions: Misinformation
Influenza
COVID-19
Vaccine Hesitancy
Communication Research
Health Behavior
Lead sponsor: University of Chicago
Sponsor class: OTHER
Collaborators: name: University of Iowa
name: University of Michigan
name: Rush University Medical Center
name: Bedford Research Corporation, Inc.
name: Tanoma Consulting
name: National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities (NIMHD)
First posted: 2024-05-16
Enrollment: 1400
Sex: ALL
Minimum age (years): 18
Maximum age (years): 99
Standard ages: ADULT
OLDER_ADULT
Accepts healthy volunteers: yes
Allocation: NON_RANDOMIZED
Intervention model: SEQUENTIAL
Intervention model description: Step wedge
Primary purpose: PREVENTION

Brief summary: Dime La VerDAD is an innovative social media capacity-building program that empowers promotores de salud to debunk vaccine misinformation through the use of personal narratives on social media. The core of the implementation strategy consists of augmenting training and self-efficacy for natural community champions, "promotores de salud" from the Hispanic community as trusted messengers to debunk vaccination misinformation. The study will leverage existing community relationships in Chicago and a first of its kind misinformation curriculum to debunk misinformation in communities served by participating promotores de salud. Dime La VerDAD (Verify, Debunk, and Disseminate) is an innovative social media capacity-building program based on theoretical frameworks related to health communication that empowers promotores de salud to debunk vaccine misinformation through the use of personal narratives on social media. This mixed methods study will use a rigorous stepped wedge design to 1) deliver a scalable program of science communicators using an adapted curriculum grounded in infodemiology, 2) evaluate how debunking misinformation is perceived on social media, and 3) discern how use of personal narratives to enhance science communication can lead to changes in opinions and behavior (vaccination rates) about COVID and influenza vaccines among Chicago's predominantly Hispanic communities.

Detailed description: Social media has accelerated the spread of vaccine misinformation leading to decreased immunization rates and increased preventable deaths in the US and globally. The health impact of misinformation is particularly critical to understand and address when considering the lives of minoritized racial and ethnic groups who are often the target of misinformation campaigns or who may not have easy access to culturally relevant and language-concordant reputable sources. Although access to vaccines remains a significant barrier, vaccine safety confidence is a significant predictor of influenza and COVID vaccination in Hispanic adults. Yet, little is known about how misinformation narratives emerge specifically in relation to Hispanic communities, how they are disseminated, and how they ultimately affect people's decision to get vaccinated.

Social media posts that include personal narratives are more effective at communicating reliable health recommendations, especially those that come from a trusted peer. Therefore, communication strategies that leverage community and interpersonal relationships can prove extremely effective at debunking misinformation about vaccines. Promotores de salud are trusted community members who serve as links between health/social services and a community to improve access to health services and quality of service delivery. Promotores can diffuse and address misinformation in their communities and can be essential to debunk myths, increase trust, and improve health outcomes. Promotores have been at the forefront of addressing disparities in COVID testing and vaccine uptake. Promotores de salud are uniquely positioned as trusted messengers to debunk vaccine misinformation through strategic use of social media and infodemiology principles.

Dime La VerDAD (Verify, Debunk, and Disseminate) is an innovative social media capacity-building program based on theoretical frameworks related to health communication that empowers promotores de salud to debunk vaccine misinformation through the use of personal narratives on social media. To date, there has been no evaluation of whether training promotores de salud to identify and debunk misinformation on social media can improve uptake of accurate scientific information. Dime La VerDAD (Verify, Debunk, and Disseminate) will evaluate how debunking misinformation is perceived on social media, and discern how these can lead to changes in opinions and behavior. The proposed work will use a rigorous stepped wedge design to:

1. Identify and evaluate promotores' use of social media to disseminate vaccine information in the Hispanic community. Investigators will conduct focus groups and key informant interviews with promotores de salud recruited through Illinois Unidos partnerships to verify their peers' information sources about vaccines, vaccine-related misbeliefs, perceptions of vaccine safety, and personal plans to get vaccinated.
2. Engage Promotores de Salud as community champions in an adapted science communication curriculum so they can learn to identify and debunk misinformation. Participants will learn how to make their own infographics to debunk misinformation as well as incorporate their personal narratives into posts. Promotores will also recruit members of their social media circles to participate as subjects to test the effectiveness of their posts.
3. Test effectiveness of personal-narrative posts versus resharing of standardized debunking content shared by promotores de salud to their social networks. Using a stepped-wedge approach, members of promotores' social media circles will be surveyed to measure the reach and effectiveness of various types of social media posts. Investigators hypothesize that community champions will be viewed as trusted messengers within their social circles and that debunking posts with personal narrative using principles from the training program will be disseminated, viewed, and recalled more often as compared to a standard post without personal narrative and lead to increased COVID and influenza vaccination uptake.

This work will test a model of community engagement and empowerment while providing greater knowledge of how credible scientific information can be shared and effect positive changes in opinions and behavior.

Eligibility criteria: Inclusion Criteria:

* Inclusion criteria: 18 years or older; fluent in English or Spanish; provide services in at least one of the priority zip codes 60639, 60651, 60623, 60608, 60629, 60632 selected as priority areas in the Protect Chicago Plus program instituted in response to the COVID19 pandemic (see Johnson AK, Smith CS, Hunt B, Jacobs J, Roesch P. Chicago's Citywide COVID-19 Vaccine Equity Program: Protect Chicago Plus. Public Health Rep. 2023;138(2):218-222. doi:10.1177/00333549221143093); have a social media presence (personal or work-related)

Exclusion Criteria:

* Exclusion: Plans to stop working as a "promotor" before spring of 2027 (end of data collection planned). People can not participate if they are under the age of 18, or can not understand Spanish and English, or do not provide services in the included zip codes, or do not wish to participate in social media.

Primary outcomes:
measure: Vaccine uptake among promotores' social media followers
timeFrame: Year 2 - Year 4
measure: Promotores' Social Media Self-Efficacy
timeFrame: Year 1 - Year 3
Secondary outcomes:
measure: Learner satisfaction
timeFrame: Year 2 - Year 4
measure: Verify vaccine-related beliefs in Hispanic communities in Chicago
timeFrame: Year 1-2
measure: Social media engagement
timeFrame: Years 1- 5
Other outcomes:
Locations:
city: Chicago
country: United States
facility: Rush University
state: Illinois
city: Chicago
country: United States
facility: University of Chicago
state: Illinois
city: Iowa City
country: United States
facility: University of Iowa
state: Iowa
city: Ann Arbor
country: United States
facility: University of Michigan
state: Michigan
Study officials:
affiliation: University of Chicago - Section of Emergency Medicine
name: Marina DelRios, MD
role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR
References: