Using Mukbang to Improve Appetite, Nutritional Status and Quality of Life in Children With Cancer

NCT ID: NCT05922553

Last Updated: 2025-08-06

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

124 participants

Study Classification

INTERVENTIONAL

Study Start Date

2024-12-16

Study Completion Date

2026-06-30

Brief Summary

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This study aims to use a two arms randomized clinical trial study to evaluate the effectiveness of the effective constituent of Mukbang in helping children with cancer hospitalized for radiotherapy and chemotherapy to improve their appetite, nutritional status and quality of life.

Detailed Description

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Cancer has a high incidence among children and adolescents worldwide. In October 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) released an overview of the Global Action on Childhood Cancer which showed that more than 400,000 children under the age of 19 were diagnosed with cancer worldwide every year. With the development and progress of diagnosis and treatment technology, the health outcome of children with cancer has been greatly improved.

However, the side effects and complications associated with cancer and its treatment can seriously affect the appetite and food intake of children with cancer, resulting in malnutrition and a low quality of life. Therefore, it is very important to effectively improve the appetite of children with cancer during treatment.

Clinical methods to improve the appetite of cancer patients mainly include drugs, diet or nutrition intervention, traditional Chinese medicine and acupuncture, but each intervention has its own advantages and disadvantages which makes the clinical application effect difficult to evaluate, in urgent need of more effective solutions to solve this problem.

Mukbang has shown great potential in helping children with cancer to improve their appetite and food consumption, finally promote nutritional health. What's more, the features of Mukbang, such as high-quality and clear pictures, relaxed atmosphere created by the video makers, sounds while eating, and attractive images of food, may promote viewers' appetite and increase their intake imperceptibly. In addition to that, watching Mukbang while eating can also provide a pleasant eating experience for children with cancer, and the interaction with the Mukbang anchor can also alleviate the loneliness of children who live in hospital for such a long time, so as to enhance the children's taste experience, relieve the negative emotions of loneliness and depression.

Research has found that Mukbang can help people with low appetites increase their food intake and the interest in food. Several studies have shown that videos containing food cues can increase viewers' appetite and decrease feelings of satiety to a certain extent. At the same time, Mukbang can also increase viewers' taste experience on the basis of physics and improve children's interest in food. Thus, Mukbang is a useful tool for those who are struggling to increase the amount and variety of acceptable foods and gain weight. It also suggests that clinicians who treat eating disorders should be aware that Mukbang is a potential factor in their illness, and that effective positive use may be helpful for patients with anorexia or restrictive eating.

Given that, Mukbang will be applied to help children with cancer to improve appetite, nutritional status and quality of life. Studies have found that food images, eating sounds and interactivity of Mukbang may play a leading role in improving appetite. Thus, we defined the active ingredients of Mukbang as food images, eating sound and interactivity in this study. Based on that, this study aims to compare the effect of active ingredient Mukbang and general short videos without food cues on improving appetite in children with cancer, to provide evidence for larger randomized controlled trials (RCTS) and provide a new direction for clinical departments to develop nutritional interventions and management programs for children with cancer.

Conditions

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Children With Cancer

Study Design

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Allocation Method

RANDOMIZED

Intervention Model

PARALLEL

Primary Study Purpose

SUPPORTIVE_CARE

Blinding Strategy

NONE

Study Groups

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Active Ingredient Mukbang

Active Ingredient Mukbang will be allocated to the participants in the experimental group. The videos which presented the food images, eating sound and a relaxing and pleasant atmosphere will be sent in sequence through the short video platforms on the smart phone to the participants in the experimental group.

Group Type EXPERIMENTAL

Active Ingredient Mukbang

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Mukbang videos include the items which can truly improve the appetite of children with cancer, such as food images, eating sound and interactivity.

General short videos

General short videos without food cues will be allocated to the participants in the placebo control group. There will be no restrictions on the type of short video platforms and specific video content.

Group Type PLACEBO_COMPARATOR

General short videos

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Short videos that don't contain any food cues.

Interventions

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Active Ingredient Mukbang

Mukbang videos include the items which can truly improve the appetite of children with cancer, such as food images, eating sound and interactivity.

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

General short videos

Short videos that don't contain any food cues.

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Eligibility Criteria

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Inclusion Criteria

* Aged between 6 to 18 years old;
* Children in accordance with the guidelines for the Diagnosis and Treatment of 12 Diseases related to hematologic diseases and malignant tumors (2021 version) issued by the General Office of the National Health Commission;
* At least experience one full cycle of chemotherapy;
* Children with moderate or higher symptoms of decreased appetite were screened for a list of treatment-related symptoms.

Exclusion Criteria

* Children with serious cardiopulmonary disease, infection, organ damage, or genetic metabolic disease, immune deficiency disease, mental illness;
* Children with eye or ear dysfunction that prevents them from watching and listening to videos.
Minimum Eligible Age

6 Years

Maximum Eligible Age

18 Years

Eligible Sex

ALL

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

No

Sponsors

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Wei XIA, PhD

OTHER

Sponsor Role lead

Responsible Party

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Wei XIA, PhD

Philosophic Doctor

Responsibility Role SPONSOR_INVESTIGATOR

Principal Investigators

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Wei Xia, PhD

Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Sun Yat-sen University

Locations

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Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hospital

Guangzhou, Guangdong, China

Site Status RECRUITING

Countries

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China

Central Contacts

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Wei Xia, PhD

Role: CONTACT

+8618823359471

Facility Contacts

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Wei Xia, PhD

Role: primary

+8618823359471

Other Identifiers

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mukbang RCT

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id

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