Use of Behavioral Economics to Improve Treatment of Acute Respiratory Infections (Pilot Study)

NCT ID: NCT01454960

Last Updated: 2017-04-04

Study Results

Results pending

The study team has not published outcome measurements, participant flow, or safety data for this trial yet. Check back later for updates.

Basic Information

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Recruitment Status

COMPLETED

Clinical Phase

NA

Total Enrollment

28 participants

Study Classification

INTERVENTIONAL

Study Start Date

2011-07-31

Study Completion Date

2014-09-30

Brief Summary

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Bacteria resistant to antibiotic therapy are a major public health problem. The evolution of multi-drug resistant pathogens may be encouraged by provider prescribing behavior. Inappropriate use of antibiotics for nonbacterial infections and overuse of broad spectrum antibiotics can lead to the development of resistant strains. Though providers are adequately trained to know when antibiotics are and are not comparatively effective, this has not been sufficient to affect critical provider practices.

The intent of this study is to apply behavioral economic theory to reduce the rate of antibiotic prescriptions for acute respiratory diagnoses for which guidelines do not call for antibiotics. Specifically targeted are infections that are likely to be viral.

The objective of this study is to improve provider decisions around treatment of acute respiratory infections.

The participants are practicing attending physicians or advanced practice nurses (i.e. providers) at participating clinics who see acute respiratory infection patients. A maximum of 550 participants will be recruited for this study.

Providers consenting to participate will fill out a baseline questionnaire online. Subsequent to baseline data collection and enrollment, participating clinic sites will be randomized to the study arms, as described below.

There will be a control arm, with clinic sites randomized in a multifactorial design to up to three interventions that leverage the electronic medical record: Order Sets that are triggered by EHR workflow containing exclusively guideline concordant choices (SA, for Suggested Alternatives); Accountable Justification (AJ) triggered by discordant prescriptions that populate the note with provider's rationale for guideline exceptions ; and performance feedback that benchmarks providers' own performance to that of their peers (PC, for Peer Comparison).

The outcomes of interest are antibiotic prescribing patterns, including prescribing rates and changes in prescribing rates over time.

The intervention period will be over one year, with a one-year follow up period to measure persistence of the effect after EHR features are returned to the original state and providers no longer receive email alerts.

Detailed Description

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Each consented provider will be randomized to 1 of 8 cells in a factorial design with equal probability. If results of retrospective data analysis imply that design will be improved by stratification, randomization will be stratified by factors that could influence outcomes.

Data will be collected from Northwestern University's Enterprise Data Warehouse which houses copies of data recorded in the Epic electronic health record. Data elements from qualifying office visits will be collected from coded portions of the electronic health record.

An encounter is eligible for intervention if the patient's diagnosis is in the selected group of acute respiratory infections. The intervention EHR functions will be triggered when clinicians initiate an antibiotic prescription or enter a diagnosis for an acute respiratory infection that has a defined Order Set. If an antibiotic from a list of frequently misprescribed antibiotics is ordered and a diagnosis has not yet been entered, providers will be prompted to enter a diagnosis. If the diagnosis entered is acute nasopharyngitis; acute laryngeopharyngitis/acute upper respiratory infection; acute bronchitis; bronchitis not specified as acute or chronic; or flu; the interventions will be triggered. The diagnosis-appropriate order set will pop-up for providers in the Suggested Alternatives (SA) arm, while clinicians randomized to the Accountable Justification (AJ) arm will receive an alert and be required to enter a brief statement justifying their antibiotic prescription if antibiotics are not indicated for the diagnosis entered. This note will then be added to the patient's medical record.

Clinicians randomized to the Peer Comparison (PC) condition will receive monthly updates about their antibiotic prescribing practices relative to other clinicians in their practice.

Conditions

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Acute Respiratory Infections (ARIs)

Study Design

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Allocation Method

RANDOMIZED

Intervention Model

FACTORIAL

Primary Study Purpose

TREATMENT

Blinding Strategy

SINGLE

Participants

Study Groups

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SA, AJ, PC

Participants are given all 3 interventions:

Suggested Alternatives, Accountable Justification, and Peer Comparison.

Group Type EXPERIMENTAL

Clinical Decision Support: Accountable Justification

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Accountable Justification is triggered by discordant prescriptions that populate the EHR note with provider's rationale for guideline exceptions (AJ).

Audit and Feedback: Peer Comparison

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Performance feedback that benchmarks providers' own performance to that of their peers (PC, for Peer Comparison).

CDS Order Sets: Suggested Alternatives

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Order Sets that are triggered by EHR workflow containing exclusively guideline concordant choices (SA, for Suggested Alternatives).

SA, AJ

Participants receive the Suggested Alternatives and Accountable Justification interventions, but not the Peer Comparison intervention.

Group Type EXPERIMENTAL

Clinical Decision Support: Accountable Justification

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Accountable Justification is triggered by discordant prescriptions that populate the EHR note with provider's rationale for guideline exceptions (AJ).

CDS Order Sets: Suggested Alternatives

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Order Sets that are triggered by EHR workflow containing exclusively guideline concordant choices (SA, for Suggested Alternatives).

SA, PC

Participants receive the Suggested Alternatives and Peer Comparison interventions, but not the Accountable Justification intervention.

Group Type EXPERIMENTAL

Audit and Feedback: Peer Comparison

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Performance feedback that benchmarks providers' own performance to that of their peers (PC, for Peer Comparison).

CDS Order Sets: Suggested Alternatives

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Order Sets that are triggered by EHR workflow containing exclusively guideline concordant choices (SA, for Suggested Alternatives).

AJ, PC

Participants receive the Accountable Justification and Peer Comparison interventions, but not the Suggested Alternatives intervention.

Group Type EXPERIMENTAL

Clinical Decision Support: Accountable Justification

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Accountable Justification is triggered by discordant prescriptions that populate the EHR note with provider's rationale for guideline exceptions (AJ).

Audit and Feedback: Peer Comparison

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Performance feedback that benchmarks providers' own performance to that of their peers (PC, for Peer Comparison).

Peer Comparison

Participants receive the Peer Comparison intervention, but do not receive the Suggested Alternatives or Accountable Justification interventions.

Group Type EXPERIMENTAL

Audit and Feedback: Peer Comparison

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Performance feedback that benchmarks providers' own performance to that of their peers (PC, for Peer Comparison).

Suggested Alternatives

Participants receive the Suggested Alternatives intervention, but not the Accountable Justification or Peer Comparison interventions.

Group Type EXPERIMENTAL

CDS Order Sets: Suggested Alternatives

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Order Sets that are triggered by EHR workflow containing exclusively guideline concordant choices (SA, for Suggested Alternatives).

Accountable Justification

Participants receive the Accountable Justification intervention, but do not receive the Suggested Alternatives or Peer Comparison interventions.

Group Type EXPERIMENTAL

Clinical Decision Support: Accountable Justification

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Accountable Justification is triggered by discordant prescriptions that populate the EHR note with provider's rationale for guideline exceptions (AJ).

Control

Participants do not receive any of the 3 interventions.

Group Type NO_INTERVENTION

No interventions assigned to this group

Interventions

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Clinical Decision Support: Accountable Justification

Accountable Justification is triggered by discordant prescriptions that populate the EHR note with provider's rationale for guideline exceptions (AJ).

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Audit and Feedback: Peer Comparison

Performance feedback that benchmarks providers' own performance to that of their peers (PC, for Peer Comparison).

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

CDS Order Sets: Suggested Alternatives

Order Sets that are triggered by EHR workflow containing exclusively guideline concordant choices (SA, for Suggested Alternatives).

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Other Intervention Names

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AJ Accountable Justification PC Peer Comparison SA Suggested Alternatives

Eligibility Criteria

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Inclusion Criteria

A practicing attending physician or advanced practice nurse ("provider") at Northwestern University's NMFF GIM Clinic in 2011-2013 who sees acute respiratory infection patients.
Minimum Eligible Age

18 Years

Eligible Sex

ALL

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

No

Sponsors

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National Institute on Aging (NIA)

NIH

Sponsor Role collaborator

University of Southern California

OTHER

Sponsor Role lead

Responsible Party

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Jason Doctor

Associate Professor

Responsibility Role PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Principal Investigators

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Stephen Persell, MD

Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Northwestern University

Jason N Doctor, PhD

Role: STUDY_DIRECTOR

University of Southern California

Locations

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Northwestern Medical Faculty Foundation General Internal Medicine Clinic

Chicago, Illinois, United States

Site Status

Countries

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United States

References

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Persell SD, Doctor JN, Friedberg MW, Meeker D, Friesema E, Cooper A, Haryani A, Gregory DL, Fox CR, Goldstein NJ, Linder JA. Behavioral interventions to reduce inappropriate antibiotic prescribing: a randomized pilot trial. BMC Infect Dis. 2016 Aug 5;16:373. doi: 10.1186/s12879-016-1715-8.

Reference Type DERIVED
PMID: 27495917 (View on PubMed)

Other Identifiers

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1RC4AG039115-01

Identifier Type: NIH

Identifier Source: secondary_id

View Link

1RC4AG039115-01-2

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id

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