Clinical trial NCT01972308: A Patient Advocate to Improve Real-world Asthma Management for Inner City Adults
Official title: A Patient Advocate to Improve Real-world Asthma Management for Inner City Adults
Study type: INTERVENTIONAL
Overall status: COMPLETED
Phase: NA
Conditions: Asthma
Communication
Keywords: asthma
patient advocate
health disparity
patient-provider communication
Lead sponsor: University of Pennsylvania
Sponsor class: OTHER
First posted: 2013-10-30
Enrollment: 312
Sex: ALL
Minimum age (years): 18
Standard ages: ADULT
OLDER_ADULT
Accepts healthy volunteers: no
Allocation: RANDOMIZED
Intervention model: PARALLEL
Primary purpose: HEALTH_SERVICES_RESEARCH

Brief summary: Few interventions to improve asthma management have targeted low-income minority asthmatic adults and even fewer have focused on the real-world practice where care is provided for these patients. This project tests the effectiveness of a Patient Advocate as a practical and sustainable method of facilitating and maintaining communication between patient and provider and access to chronic care for adults with moderate or severe asthma recruited from clinics serving low-income urban neighborhoods. We compare the use of a Patient Advocate to current asthma care and test the Patient Advocate's cost-effectiveness.

Detailed description: This 5 year project tests the effectiveness, sustainability, and budget impact of a patient navigator intervention to facilitate and maintain patient-provider communication and access to chronic care of moderate or severe asthma in low income minority adults with other chronic morbidities. We will recruit from a variety of clinic practices including those of an urban academic health center, a VA, and a federally qualified health center and in both English-speaking and Spanish-speaking patients. The intervention is tailored to patients and their clinics, and informed by focus groups of patients and providers.

The Patient Advocate (PA), works with patients by coaching and modeling preparation for a visit with the asthma doctor, attending the visit with the permission of participant and provider, and confirming understanding of issues discussed. The PA also facilitates scheduling, obtaining insurance coverage, overcoming patients' unique social and administrative barriers to carrying out medical advice, and exchange of information between providers and patients. The PAs are recent college graduates interested in health-related or education careers, research experience, working with patients, and generally have the same race/ethnicity distribution as potential subjects.

This dissemination and implementation project refines the intervention of RC1 HL099612 for real-world practice by 1) conducting a randomized controlled trial that compares the Patient Advocate Intervention (PAI) to currently practiced guideline-based usual care; 2) carrying out the intervention in a variety of primary care and asthma specialty practices; 3) extending the observation time to a year to test its sustainability; 4) assessing patient-centered outcomes including asthma control, quality of life, ED visits, and hospitalizations; 5) assessing mediators/moderators of the PAI-asthma outcome relationship; and 6) evaluating its cost-effectiveness.

We will recruit 300 adults, each to be followed for at least 1 year with moderate or severe persistent asthma from clinics serving low-income, urban, primarily minority patients and conduct a randomized controlled trial (RCT) to: 1) assess whether 6 months of the PAI improves asthma control relative to baseline compared with usual care (UC) and whether such a difference is sustained in the 6 months following the intervention's completion, 2) Assess whether the PAI improves other asthma outcomes (need for prednisone bursts, ED visits, hospitalizations, quality of life, FEV1) relative to baseline compared with UC at 6 months and is sustained in the 6 months following the intervention's completion, 3) examine mediators and moderators of the relationship between the intervention and outcome, 4) assess the incremental direct and indirect costs of the PAI compared to usual care and the cost-effectiveness of the PAI relative to UC for the outcomes, and 5) in post-study focus groups of providers to explore awareness of the intervention and response to the PA

Eligibility criteria: Inclusion Criteria:

1. \> 18 years of age,
2. physician's diagnosis of asthma,
3. prescribed an inhaled-steroid-containing medication for asthma (ensuring the patient is believed to have moderate or severe reversible airways obstruction by their physician),
4. moderate or severe persistent asthma according to the NHLBI Guidelines,
5. evidence of reversible airflow obstruction: (a) forced expiratory volume in 1 second (FEV1) \< 80% predicted at the time of screening or within the 3 years prior to this screening, and (b) improvement with bronchodilator: either (i) an increase of \>15% and 200ml in FEV1 with asthma treatment over the previous 3 years or (ii) after 4 puffs of albuterol by MDI (or 2.5 mg by nebulizer), an increase in FEV1 or FVC \>12% and 200 ml in FEV1 within 30 minutes,
6. at least one appointment scheduled with the asthma physician during the 1st 6 months of participation

Exclusion Criteria:

1. Severe psychiatric or cognitive problems (e.g., obvious mania, schizophrenia, significant mental retardation) that make it impossible to understand and carryout PA activities.
2. Unable to understand and provide informed consent,
3. Unable to communicate in English or Spanish.
4. Participants of the pilot study for this project are excluded

Primary outcomes:
measure: Change in Asthma Control at One Year
timeFrame: baseline and 1 year
Secondary outcomes:
measure: Change in Emergency Department(ED) Visits at One Year
timeFrame: one year
measure: Change in Asthma-related Quality of Life
timeFrame: baseline to one year
measure: Change in Hospitalizations
timeFrame: one year
measure: Risk of Prednisone Bursts
timeFrame: baseline and one year
measure: Change in Urgent Office Visit
timeFrame: one year
Other outcomes:
Locations:
city: Philadelphia
country: United States
facility: University of Pennsylvania Health System
state: Pennsylvania
Study officials:
affiliation: University of Pennsylvania
name: Andrea J Apter, MD
role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR
References:
citation: Apter AJ, Wan F, Reisine S, Bogen DK, Rand C, Bender B, Bennett IM, Gonzalez R, Priolo C, Sonnad SS, Bryant-Stephens T, Ferguson M, Boyd RC, Ten Have T, Roy J. Feasibility, acceptability and preliminary effectiveness of patient advocates for improving asthma outcomes in adults. J Asthma. 2013 Oct;50(8):850-60. doi: 10.3109/02770903.2013.812655. Epub 2013 Jul 17.
citation: Apter AJ, Wan F, Reisine S, Bender B, Rand C, Bogen DK, Bennett IM, Bryant-Stephens T, Roy J, Gonzalez R, Priolo C, Have TT, Morales KH. The association of health literacy with adherence and outcomes in moderate-severe asthma. J Allergy Clin Immunol. 2013 Aug;132(2):321-7. doi: 10.1016/j.jaci.2013.02.014. Epub 2013 Apr 13.
citation: Apter AJ, Bryant-Stephens T, Morales KH, Wan F, Hardy S, Reed-Wells S, Dominguez M, Gonzalez R, Mak N, Nardi A, Park H, Howell JT, Localio R. Using IT to improve access, communication, and asthma in African American and Hispanic/Latino Adults: Rationale, design, and methods of a randomized controlled trial. Contemp Clin Trials. 2015 Sep;44:119-128. doi: 10.1016/j.cct.2015.08.001. Epub 2015 Aug 8.
citation: Bryant-Stephens T, Reed-Wells S, Canales M, Perez L, Rogers M, Localio AR, Apter AJ. Home visits are needed to address asthma health disparities in adults. J Allergy Clin Immunol. 2016 Dec;138(6):1526-1530. doi: 10.1016/j.jaci.2016.10.006. Epub 2016 Oct 21.
citation: Kramer CB, LeRoy L, Donahue S, Apter AJ, Bryant-Stephens T, Elder JP, Hamilton WJ, Krishnan JA, Shelef DQ, Stout JW, Sumino K, Teach SJ, Federman AD. Enrolling African-American and Latino patients with asthma in comparative effectiveness research: Lessons learned from 8 patient-centered studies. J Allergy Clin Immunol. 2016 Dec;138(6):1600-1607. doi: 10.1016/j.jaci.2016.10.011. Epub 2016 Oct 24.
citation: Apter AJ, Perez L, Han X, Ndicu G, Localio A, Park H, Mullen AN, Klusaritz H, Rogers M, Cidav Z, Bryant-Stephens T, Bender BG, Reisine ST, Morales KH. Patient Advocates for Low-Income Adults with Moderate to Severe Asthma: A Randomized Clinical Trial. J Allergy Clin Immunol Pract. 2020 Nov-Dec;8(10):3466-3473.e11. doi: 10.1016/j.jaip.2020.06.058. Epub 2020 Jul 14.
citation: Korwin A, Black H, Perez L, Morales KH, Klusaritz H, Han X, Huang J, Rogers M, Ndicu G, Apter AJ. Exploring Patient Engagement: A Qualitative Analysis of Low-Income Urban Participants in Asthma Research. J Allergy Clin Immunol Pract. 2017 Nov-Dec;5(6):1625-1631.e2. doi: 10.1016/j.jaip.2017.03.022. Epub 2017 May 10.
citation: Buckey TM, Morales KH, Apter AJ. Understanding Autonomy in Patients with Moderate to Severe Asthma. J Allergy Clin Immunol Pract. 2022 Feb;10(2):525-533. doi: 10.1016/j.jaip.2021.10.068. Epub 2021 Nov 14.