Scalable TELeheaLth Cancer CARe: The STELLAR Program to Treat Cancer Risk Behaviors

NCT ID: NCT05687604

Last Updated: 2025-05-29

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

RECRUITING

Clinical Phase

NA

Total Enrollment

1500 participants

Study Classification

INTERVENTIONAL

Study Start Date

2024-09-24

Study Completion Date

2027-07-31

Brief Summary

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The goal of this clinical trial is to improve cancer patient's health, survival, and quality of life by dispelling risk behaviors for Northwestern Memorial Health Care (NMHC) patients who are cancer survivors.

The main question\[s\] STELLAR aims to answer are:

* How best to combine three behavior interventions (physical activity promotion, smoking cessation, obesity treatment) into one treatment.
* Evaluate the reach of the program. We will look at the number, proportion, and representativeness of participants in terms of disease characteristics, socioeconomic status, telehealth readiness, and race/ethnicity.
* Evaluate the effects of the STELLAR program relative to enhanced usual care (information provision) on cancer risk behaviors, patient care access, care quality, and communication.

Participants will be provided goals related to their physical activity, smoking, and/or weight loss and asked to track their health behaviors via an app, excel file, or on paper. At baseline, 3 months, 6 months and 9 months into the study, participants will provide survey responses and physical measurements like height and weight. Additionally, those in the Facilitated group will complete 12 telehealth sessions with study staff to discuss progress towards their study goals.

Researchers will compare the Facilitated group to the Self Guided group to see if the Facilitated intervention group is able to reach more participants that enhances care only.

Detailed Description

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The goal of this clinical trial is to decrease adverse outcomes and improve cancer patient's health, survival, and quality of life by dispelling risk behaviors for Northwestern Memorial Health Care (NMHC) patients.

The main question\[s\] STELLAR aims to answer are:

* How best to combine three existing effective cancer risk behavior interventions (physical activity promotion, smoking cessation, obesity treatment) into one treatment program within the existing NMHC environment.
* Evaluate the reach of the FACILITATED program. We will look at the number, proportion, and representativeness of individuals who are willing to participate in terms of disease characteristics, socioeconomic status, telehealth readiness, and race/ethnicity.
* Evaluate the effects of the FACILITATED program relative to enhanced usual care (information provision) on cancer risk behaviors, patient care access, care quality, healthcare utilization, patient-provider communication, cost and health outcomes (symptoms and quality of life).

Participants will be recruited through several channels (MyNM, direct outreach from research staff, EDW). Interested patients will then be randomly assigned to the STELLAR program arm, or Enhanced Usual Care. Participants in the STELLAR program will be enrolled for a year into the program. Participants will be provided goals related to their physical activity, smoking, and/or weight loss and asked to track their health behaviors via an app, excel file, or on paper. At baseline, 3 months, 6 months and 9 months into the study, participants will provide survey responses and physical measurements like height and weight. Additionally, those in the FACILITATED group will complete 12 telehealth sessions with study staff to discuss progress towards their study goals.

Researchers will compare the FACILITATED intervention group to the SELF GUIDED group to see if the FACILITATED intervention group is able to reach more participants that Self Guided only.

Conditions

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Obesity Smoking Cessation Physical Inactivity

Study Design

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Allocation Method

RANDOMIZED

Intervention Model

PARALLEL

This is a randomized control trial with 2 parallel intervention arms. One arm will be the active treatment group, and the other an enhanced usual-care control group. Assessors will be blinded to study condition, and intervention will be behavioral.
Primary Study Purpose

TREATMENT

Blinding Strategy

SINGLE

Outcome Assessors

Study Groups

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FACILITATED Program

STELLAR arm participants will receive goals related to their physical activity, smoking, and/or obesity, and will be asked to meet those goals weekly/daily. Participants will also be asked to record their weight, activity, and/or cigarette smoking daily, and will complete 12 telehealth sessions with study staff across the 9 months of the study. Will have physical measures taken or extracted from the medical record at baseline, 3 months, 6 months, and 9 months.

Group Type ACTIVE_COMPARATOR

multiple behavior change therapy

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

goals related to their physical activity, smoking, and/or obesity, and will be asked to meet those goals weekly/daily. Participants will also be asked to record their weight, activity, and/or cigarette smoking daily, and will complete 16 telehealth sessions with study staff across the 12 months of the study. Will have physical measures taken or extracted from the medical record at baseline, 3 months, 6 months, and 12 months.

SELF GUIDED Program

Patients in the EUC group will receive informational packets about their risk behaviors - obesity, physical inactivity, and/or smoking. Will have physical measures taken or extracted from the medical record at baseline, 3 months, 6 months, and 9 months

Group Type NO_INTERVENTION

No interventions assigned to this group

Interventions

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multiple behavior change therapy

goals related to their physical activity, smoking, and/or obesity, and will be asked to meet those goals weekly/daily. Participants will also be asked to record their weight, activity, and/or cigarette smoking daily, and will complete 16 telehealth sessions with study staff across the 12 months of the study. Will have physical measures taken or extracted from the medical record at baseline, 3 months, 6 months, and 12 months.

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Eligibility Criteria

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Inclusion Criteria

* Northwestern Medicine patient
* Over 18 years old
* Meet at least 1 of the following 3 criteria:
* Engage in \<150 min/week of physical activity
* BMI of ≥25
* Report that they currently smoke or smoked within the last year
* Diagnosed with any cancer (except non-melanoma skin)
* Ability to attend telehealth visits either via landline, cell phone, smartphone, tablet, laptop, or desktop computer
* 3 months post curative intent treatment if BMI of ≥25 or engage in \<150 min/week of physical activity
* Post curative intent treatment if they currently smoke or smoked within the last year

Exclusion Criteria

* Currently in another dietary, weight loss, smoking cessation (including cessation pharmacotherapy), or physical activity treatment/intervention.
* Limited level of oral and written English or Spanish
* Cognitively impaired adults
* Prisoners
* Participants will be excluded from the physical activity and weight loss interventions (but not the smoking cessation component) for:
* Absolute contraindications to exercise (i.e., acute myocardial infarction, complete heart block, acute congestive heart failure, unstable angina, uncontrolled hypertension), metastatic disease or planned elective surgery
* Pregnant or plans to become pregnant.
* Individuals engaging in the physical activity or weight loss interventions must pass pre- physical activity participation screening or obtain medical clearance
Minimum Eligible Age

18 Years

Eligible Sex

ALL

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

No

Sponsors

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Northwestern University

OTHER

Sponsor Role lead

Responsible Party

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Brian Hitsman

Associate Professor of Preventive Medicine

Responsibility Role PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Principal Investigators

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Brian Hitsman, PhD

Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Northwestern University

Sofia Garcia, PhD

Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Northwestern University

Siobhan Phillips, PhD

Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Northwestern University

Bonnie Spring, PhD

Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Florida State University

Locations

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Northwestern University-Feinberg School of Medicine

Chicago, Illinois, United States

Site Status RECRUITING

Countries

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United States

Central Contacts

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Rana Mazzetta, LMSW

Role: CONTACT

312-503-6595

Laura Scanlan

Role: CONTACT

312-503-1395

Facility Contacts

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Bonnie Sring, Ph.D.

Role: primary

312-908-2293

References

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Spring B, Garcia SF, Daly E, Jacobs M, Jayeoba M, Jordan N, Kircher S, Kocherginsky M, Mazzetta R, Pollack T, Scanlan L, Scherr C, Hitsman B, Phillips SM. Scalable Telehealth Cancer Care: integrated healthy lifestyle program to live well after cancer treatment. J Natl Cancer Inst Monogr. 2024 Jun 26;2024(64):83-91. doi: 10.1093/jncimonographs/lgae020.

Reference Type BACKGROUND
PMID: 38924795 (View on PubMed)

Rendle KA, Tan ASL, Spring B, Bange EM, Lipitz-Snyderman A, Morris MJ, Makarov DV, Daly R, Garcia SF, Hitsman B, Ogedegbe O, Phillips S, Sherman SE, Stetson PD, Vachani A, Wainwright JV, Zullig LL, Bekelman JE. A Framework for Integrating Telehealth Equitably across the cancer care continuum. J Natl Cancer Inst Monogr. 2024 Jun 26;2024(64):92-99. doi: 10.1093/jncimonographs/lgae021.

Reference Type BACKGROUND
PMID: 38924790 (View on PubMed)

Other Identifiers

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P50CA271353

Identifier Type: NIH

Identifier Source: org_study_id

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