Rwanda Digital Dashboard Hybrid Type 3 Implementation Study

NCT ID: NCT06941831

Last Updated: 2025-07-30

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

1810 participants

Study Classification

INTERVENTIONAL

Study Start Date

2025-01-30

Study Completion Date

2029-05-31

Brief Summary

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Mental disorders are leading causes of the health-related burden globally, and in Rwanda the intergenerational mental health consequences of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi persist and are further compounded by poverty, such that recent studies have found 20% of the Rwandan population has one or more mental disorders.

The Research Program on Children and Adversity (RPCA) has expanded its evidence-based home-visiting Sugira Muryango (SM) in Rwanda. The current study aims to assess a digitally enhanced delivery of Sugira Muryango to meet the needs of the Government of Rwanda in expanding the mental health and social services infrastructure.

The proposed research will test the feasibility, acceptability and impact of a technology-enabled service delivery model using a digital tool that streamlines data collection, improves visibility of key program performance metrics, and serves as a resource for learning materials that can be used for continuous learning and training of a non-specialized workforce that is delivering an evidence-based intervention that improves caregiver mental health and family functioning. What the team learn from technology-supported delivery of Sugira Muryango - an evidence-based, trauma-informed, family-based behavioral intervention in Rwanda - can be used to improve the efficiency, effectiveness, and scalability of evidence-based mental health services in Rwanda and globally.

Detailed Description

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Globally, mental disorders are the second largest contributor to the burden of disease in adults. In settings disrupted by war and civil unrest, violence and loss contribute to significant unaddressed burden of mental disorders and family violence in adults with subsequent risks to children. In Rwanda the intergenerational mental health consequences of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda persist; recent studies found that 20% of the Rwandan population has one or more mental disorders with the highest rates observed in Genocide survivors.

Sugira Muryango is an evidence-based, trauma-informed, family-based behavioral intervention to promote healthy family functioning, early childhood development and reduce family violence. In several trials, Sugira Muryango has led to improvements in parental mental health and child development outcomes including social and emotional development of children, improved caregiver mental health and reductions in family violence. To support scaling the intervention the University of Rwanda and other partners developed a Digital Dashboard tool that: (a) streamlines collection of data on evidence-based intervention quality and reach; (b) improves visibility and searchability of implementation data by region; (c) facilitates caregiver mental health and social services referrals and follow up; and (d) serves as a training platform with resources to enhance interventionist fidelity and competence. In the context of understanding important factors for scaling evidence-based interventions, the proposed research will investigate dashboard-supported delivery of Sugira Muryango in terms of its reach, efficiency, and cost effectiveness.

This Hybrid Type 3 implementation-effectiveness study will collect outcomes measuring the program's effectiveness, quality of program delivery, feasibility, and acceptability from program beneficiaries, the interventionists, the interventionists' supervisors, and community stakeholders.

The study will compare the trajectories of fidelity, competence, and self-efficacy between dashboard-supported delivery and standard delivery. The study will also include social network analysis to understand how the characteristics of networks comprised of supervisors and interventionists affect trajectories over time. Lastly, the study will investigate the impact of dashboard-supported delivery by comparing the difference in child and caregiver mental health outcomes with standard delivery. These data will be used to analyze cost-effectiveness and return on investment of the intervention as delivered with and without the Dashboard. The results of the proposed research will identify scalable pathways to accelerate integration of technology and evidence-based mental health services into policy and practice in Rwanda.

Specific study aims and hypotheses are listed below:

Aim 1: Conduct a Hybrid Type 3 implementation-effectiveness cluster randomized trial to compare Dashboard-supported delivery of Sugira Muryango to standard delivery in Kirehe District (12 sectors).

* Aim 1.1: Compare competence and fidelity of IZUs' Sugira Muryango technology-enabled delivery compared to standard delivery.
* Hypothesis 1.1: IZU competence and fidelity scores for Dashboard-supported delivery will be superior to standard delivery.
* Aim 1:2: Investigate whether Dashboard-supported delivery affects IZU sustainment of evidence-based practices.
* Hypothesis 1.2: Dashboard-supported delivery will improve IZU readiness to change and buy-in thereby moderating adoption and sustainment of evidence-based practices.

Aim 2: Use social network analysis to examine cross-site learning-communications, knowledge flow, stakeholder interactions-across the PLAY Collaborative. The investigative team will compare sectors with and without Dashboard-supported delivery in Kirehe District.

* Aim 2.1: Compare the structure of communication and knowledge networks between Dashboard-supported and standard delivery by examining key metrics of network size, density, and centrality.
* Hypothesis 2.1: Technology-supported compared to standard delivery will have higher cross-site learning that is manifest in larger network size, density, and centrality measures.
* Aim 2.2: Examine effects of supervisors' personal networks characteristics (network size, communication frequency, quality and content of interactions) on IZU fidelity, competence, and knowledge of mental health promotion.
* Hypothesis 2.2: Personal network characteristics for supervisors (egos) and IZUs (alters/peers) will improve IZUs' competence, fidelity, internalized mental health knowledge, and self-efficacy.

Aim 3: Leverage GoR infrastructure to examine whether technology-supported delivery increases Sugira Muryango impact, efficiency, and return-on-investment. Child and caregiver behavioral, child development, and family violence outcomes will be used to conduct incremental cost-effectiveness and return on investment analyses that evaluate benefits from a societal perspective.

* Hypothesis 3.1: Dashboard-supported delivery will have superior effects on mental health, family violence, and child development outcomes compared with standard delivery.
* Hypothesis 3.2: Dashboard-supported delivery will demonstrate greater efficiency (e.g., time-to-resolution of risk-of-harm cases of family mental health and violence). - Hypothesis 3.3: Technology-supported delivery will be cost-effective and provide value based on social returns criteria.

Conditions

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IPV Mental Health Discipline Practices Quality Assurance Provider Confidence Provider Skill Quality of Life

Study Design

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Allocation Method

RANDOMIZED

Intervention Model

PARALLEL

Primary Study Purpose

HEALTH_SERVICES_RESEARCH

Blinding Strategy

SINGLE

Outcome Assessors

Study Groups

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Usual Care Sugira Muryango Implementation

Sugira Muryango delivery using usual care data entry, supervision, and quality monitoring tools and protocols (paper forms, static data entry platform).

Sugira Muryango is a home-visiting intervention that promotes playful parenting, father engagement, improved nutrition, care seeking, and family functioning to promote ECD, positive parent-child relationships, and healthy child development. Sugira Muryango integrates these core components into 12 modules and two booster/follow-up sessions (3 and 6-months after intervention).

Group Type ACTIVE_COMPARATOR

Usual Care - Sugira Muryango Implementation

Intervention Type OTHER

Sugira Muryango intervention is delivered using traditional supervision, data entry, and quality monitoring tools.

Digital Dashboard Supported

Sugira Muryango delivery using a Digital dashboard aimed at improving data collection, monitoring, and usability, facilitating social services referrals, and interventionist supervision and training.

Sugira Muryango is a home-visiting intervention that promotes playful parenting, father engagement, improved nutrition, care seeking, and family functioning to promote ECD, positive parent-child relationships, and healthy child development. Sugira Muryango integrates these core components into 12 modules and two booster/follow-up sessions (3 and 6-months after intervention).

Group Type EXPERIMENTAL

Digital Dashboard-Supported Sugira Muryango Implementation

Intervention Type OTHER

Arm investigating technology-supported delivery of Sugira Muryango, specifically, the use of a Digital Dashboard tool developed in partnership with the University of Rwanda. Developed using co-design and user interface/user experience techniques, the Dashboard (a) streamlines collection of data on evidence-based intervention quality and reach; (b) improves visibility and searchability of implementation data by region; (c) facilitates caregiver mental health and social services referrals and follow up, and (d) serves as a training platform with resources to enhance lay worker fidelity (content-specific skills) and competence (cross-cutting skills) in evidence-based intervention delivery.

Interventions

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Digital Dashboard-Supported Sugira Muryango Implementation

Arm investigating technology-supported delivery of Sugira Muryango, specifically, the use of a Digital Dashboard tool developed in partnership with the University of Rwanda. Developed using co-design and user interface/user experience techniques, the Dashboard (a) streamlines collection of data on evidence-based intervention quality and reach; (b) improves visibility and searchability of implementation data by region; (c) facilitates caregiver mental health and social services referrals and follow up, and (d) serves as a training platform with resources to enhance lay worker fidelity (content-specific skills) and competence (cross-cutting skills) in evidence-based intervention delivery.

Intervention Type OTHER

Usual Care - Sugira Muryango Implementation

Sugira Muryango intervention is delivered using traditional supervision, data entry, and quality monitoring tools.

Intervention Type OTHER

Eligibility Criteria

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Inclusion Criteria

Inclusion Criteria:

* Household inclusion criteria: Participants must be the primary caregiver to a child between birth and 36 months. Caregivers must live in the same household as the child and must be the child's legal guardian. Legal guardians may be parents, aunts, uncles, grandparents, or foster parents. Participants must be categorized as Ubudehe 1 under the socio-economic categorization of households from LODA.
* Government Official inclusion criteria: Government officials must be located at the Village, Cell, Sector and/or District level and must participate in the 1-day ECD training. Government officials must also agree to participate in the PLAY Collaborative activities throughout the course of program delivery.
* IZU interventionist inclusion criteria: IZUs must be a part of the Inshuti z'Umuryango/Friends of the Family program, must be over the age of 18, and must be literate in Kinyarwanda.
* Cell Level IZU Mentor inclusion criteria: Cell Level IZU Coordinators must be situated at the Cell Level and able to supervise at least 12 IZU interventionists, must be over 18 years of age, and must be literate in Kinyarwanda.

Exclusion Criteria:

* Household exclusion criteria: Potential participants will be excluded if they do not meet the inclusion criteria above, are experiencing an active crisis (e.g., psychosis), or have severe cognitive impairments which preclude their ability to speak to the research questions/assessments under scrutiny.
* Government Official exclusion criteria: Government officials will be excluded from participation in the PLAY Collaborative if they are not located at the Cell, Sector or District level and if they are unable to meet the demands of participation in the PLAY Collaborative.
* IZU interventionist exclusion criteria: IZUs will be excluded from participation if they do not meet the inclusion criteria above and if they are unable to meet the demands of delivering the Sugira Muryango program.
* Cell Level IZU Mentor exclusion criteria: Cell Level IZU Coordinators will be excluded if they do not meet the inclusion criteria above or are unable to meet the demands of supporting the delivery of the Sugira Muryango program.
Minimum Eligible Age

18 Years

Eligible Sex

ALL

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Sponsors

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National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)

NIH

Sponsor Role collaborator

Boston College

OTHER

Sponsor Role lead

Responsible Party

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Responsibility Role SPONSOR

Principal Investigators

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Theresa S Betancourt, MA, Sc.D.

Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Boston College Research Program on Children and Adversity

Locations

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FXB-Rwanda / 2XHQ+F2G Umerenge wa Runda, Runda, Rwanda

Kigali, Kigali, Rwanda

Site Status RECRUITING

Countries

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Rwanda

Central Contacts

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Lauren J Pisani, PhD

Role: CONTACT

617-552-8397

Emmanuel J KAYITANA

Role: CONTACT

+(250) 780 925 908

Facility Contacts

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Jean Marie Vianney Sugira Muryango Program Manager

Role: primary

+250 788764466

Gabriela Phend Program Manager Sugira Muryango

Role: backup

+250786285910

References

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Public-Private Infrastructure Advisory Facility. Rwanda: Optimization of the KTRN national fiber backbone and 4G network. Published online April 1, 2019

Reference Type BACKGROUND

Desmond C, Watt KG, Jensen SKG, Simmons E, Murray SM, Farrar J, Placencio-Castro M, Sezibera V, Rawlings LB, Wilson B, Betancourt TS. Measuring the cost-effectiveness of a home-visiting intervention to promote early child development among rural families linked to the Rwandan social protection system. PLOS Glob Public Health. 2023 Oct 24;3(10):e0002473. doi: 10.1371/journal.pgph.0002473. eCollection 2023.

Reference Type BACKGROUND
PMID: 37874790 (View on PubMed)

Moullin JC, Dickson KS, Stadnick NA, Rabin B, Aarons GA. Systematic review of the Exploration, Preparation, Implementation, Sustainment (EPIS) framework. Implement Sci. 2019 Jan 5;14(1):1. doi: 10.1186/s13012-018-0842-6.

Reference Type BACKGROUND
PMID: 30611302 (View on PubMed)

Betancourt TS, Jensen SKG, Barnhart DA, Brennan RT, Murray SM, Yousafzai AK, Farrar J, Godfroid K, Bazubagira SM, Rawlings LB, Wilson B, Sezibera V, Kamurase A. Promoting parent-child relationships and preventing violence via home-visiting: a pre-post cluster randomised trial among Rwandan families linked to social protection programmes. BMC Public Health. 2020 May 6;20(1):621. doi: 10.1186/s12889-020-08693-7.

Reference Type BACKGROUND
PMID: 32375840 (View on PubMed)

Aarons GA, Fettes DL, Hurlburt MS, Palinkas LA, Gunderson L, Willging CE, Chaffin MJ. Collaboration, negotiation, and coalescence for interagency-collaborative teams to scale-up evidence-based practice. J Clin Child Adolesc Psychol. 2014;43(6):915-28. doi: 10.1080/15374416.2013.876642. Epub 2014 Mar 10.

Reference Type BACKGROUND
PMID: 24611580 (View on PubMed)

Aarons GA, Hurlburt M, Horwitz SM. Advancing a conceptual model of evidence-based practice implementation in public service sectors. Adm Policy Ment Health. 2011 Jan;38(1):4-23. doi: 10.1007/s10488-010-0327-7.

Reference Type BACKGROUND
PMID: 21197565 (View on PubMed)

Jensen SK, Placencio-Castro M, Murray SM, Brennan RT, Goshev S, Farrar J, Yousafzai A, Rawlings LB, Wilson B, Habyarimana E, Sezibera V, Betancourt TS. Effect of a home-visiting parenting program to promote early childhood development and prevent violence: a cluster-randomized trial in Rwanda. BMJ Glob Health. 2021 Jan;6(1):e003508. doi: 10.1136/bmjgh-2020-003508.

Reference Type BACKGROUND
PMID: 33514591 (View on PubMed)

Betancourt TS, Thomson D, VanderWeele TJ. War-Related Traumas and Mental Health Across Generations. JAMA Psychiatry. 2018 Jan 1;75(1):5-6. doi: 10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2017.3530. No abstract available.

Reference Type BACKGROUND
PMID: 29188290 (View on PubMed)

Jensen SKG, Sezibera V, Murray SM, Brennan RT, Betancourt TS. Intergenerational impacts of trauma and hardship through parenting. J Child Psychol Psychiatry. 2021 Aug;62(8):989-999. doi: 10.1111/jcpp.13359. Epub 2020 Dec 7.

Reference Type BACKGROUND
PMID: 33284991 (View on PubMed)

Betancourt TS, Williams TP, Kellner SE, Gebre-Medhin J, Hann K, Kayiteshonga Y. Interrelatedness of child health, protection and well-being: an application of the SAFE model in Rwanda. Soc Sci Med. 2012 May;74(10):1504-11. doi: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2012.01.030. Epub 2012 Mar 9.

Reference Type BACKGROUND
PMID: 22459187 (View on PubMed)

Mathers CD, Loncar D. Projections of global mortality and burden of disease from 2002 to 2030. PLoS Med. 2006 Nov;3(11):e442. doi: 10.1371/journal.pmed.0030442.

Reference Type BACKGROUND
PMID: 17132052 (View on PubMed)

Other Identifiers

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R01MH136200

Identifier Type: NIH

Identifier Source: secondary_id

View Link

5116621

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id

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