View clinical trials related to Chronic Disease.
Filter by:Breathing movements, called chest wall motion, are very complex. The investigators are studying how movement of the abdomen, ribs and diaphragm contribute to breathing and how this differs with different diseases in the chest. Breathing movements may help with diagnosis, assessment of severity or assessing the impact of treatments for chest conditions. The investigators are following people who have a chest disease, measuring their chest wall motion and comparing it to their diagnosis and and how their treatment works. Chest wall motion can be measured in different ways at rest and whilst exercising. Small stickers on the chest can be used to reflect infra red light or visible squares of light can be shone onto the chest without using stickers.
The overall goal of this study is to compare how well motivational messages (text messages from the doctor's office), diabetes health coaches, and enhanced usual care with diabetes education materials (provided at the doctor's office) work to help African-American adults with uncontrolled diabetes improve their diabetes self-care decisions. Self-care is difficult when you have diabetes, especially when patients have other medical conditions, their diabetes is uncontrolled, and when they live in an area without many primary care doctors. Many studies have show that encouraging text messages from the doctor's office and health coaches can help people take better care of themselves. But before primary care clinics around the country start trying to send texts, hire health coaches, or provide additional educational materials it is critical for them to know which approach is more likely to help. This study will assign African-American diabetics to either text messages, health coaches, or enhanced care to find out which one works better. The investigators especially want to find out if one works better for people at highest risk. Lastly, the investigators want to find out if messages or coaches help people improve their blood sugar, quality of life, and their feelings about primary care. The study will test messages, coaches, and enhanced care side by side in primary care doctors' offices. The messaging and coaching programs will give patients pretty much the same information, but in different ways. The text messages will be written carefully based on each patient's needs and interests. The coaches will be trained in how to help people get motivated and work to reach their health goals. This study will include 646 African-American adults, ages 18 and above, with uncontrolled diabetes and one or more additional chronic condition, living in medically underserved communities. People will have to have a cell phone or smart phone with texting capability and be able to use it to participate. 258 participants will get messages, 258 will get coaches, and 130 will receive enhanced care. The investigators will be able to tell if messages and coaches work by seeing if people improve their diabetes self-care decisions, and if their blood sugar, quality of life, and feelings about primary care get better. The long-term study goal is to get primary care clinics all over the country to start using motivational messages or health coaches if they work well.
Background/Aims: Large scale adoption of integrated care for chronic patients constitutes a key milestone to accelerate adaptation of current healthcare systems to the evolving needs triggered by population ageing and high prevalence of chronic conditions. Lessons learnt from deployment experiences are being disseminated as "good practices". But, there is need for further assessment of implementation strategies in real world scenarios. Moreover, progresses achieved in disease-oriented integrated care cannot be automatically transferred to management of complex chronic patients (CCP). The protocol addresses five aims: 1) implementation of two integrated care interventions using a collaborative and adaptive case management (ACM) approach (i) Community-based management of CCP; and, ii) Integrated care for patients under long-term oxygen therapy (LTOT)); 2) adoption of information and communication technologies (ICT) required to support collaborative ACM; 3) to evaluate the impact of enhanced clinical health risk assessment and stratification; 5) to generate a roadmap for regional adoption of the CCP program. Methods/Design: the CCP program will be deployed in three healthcare sector of Barcelona-Esquerra (AISBE) (520 k citizens) and in two other areas of Catalonia: Badalona Serveis Assistencials (BSA) (420 k citizens) and Lleida (366 k citizens) following Plan-Do-Study-Act iterative cycles, using the Model for Assessment of Telemedicine for evaluation purposes. The study also addresses the steps for scale-up of integrated care in the entire Catalan region (7.5 M citizens). Observational studies with matched controls have been planned for both Community-based management of CCP (n=3.000) and for Integrated care for patients under LTOT (n=500). Moreover, clustered randomized controlled trials (RCT) are planned on top of the observational studies to test specific questions (i.e. performance of the ICT platform providing ACM functionalities). Main components of CCP program are: a) patient stratification; b) comprehensive assessment strategies; c) ICT supported adaptive Case management; d) Roadmap for regional adoption. Hypothesis: the CCP program will generate guidelines for large scale deployment of the CCP program, including transferability analysis, facilitating adoption of integrated care services for management of multi-morbidity.
The purpose of this research study is to investigate the potential benefits of participant use of a smartphone application ("App") called COPD Co-Pilot™. When used by the participant, COPD Co-Pilot™ may provide early detection of worsening COPD symptoms. Early symptom detection may allow the pulmonary providers and nurses to respond with timely medical advice and treatment. The goal for use of COPD Co-Pilot™ is to reduce the frequency and duration of hospitalizations, emergency department visits, and hospital readmissions. The study will also examine the financial impact of the COPD Co-Pilot™ program to determine whether costs of hospital stays, emergency department visits, and hospital readmissions differ when patients are enrolled in COPD Co-Pilot™ than when they are not enrolled. Another purpose of this study is to measure patient satisfaction with use of COPD Co-Pilot™.
Older adults living with incurable and advancing life-limiting illness frequently desire to spend as much time as possible comfortably at home, rather than in hospital. They often have complex problems that not only affect their ability to function, but also their and their family caregivers' overall quality of life (QOL). Routine assessment of their perceived health care needs and their self-reported QOL is necessary to ensure that patients' and family caregivers' concerns are visible to home care clinicians so that they can be effectively monitored and addressed. These types of assessments involve asking people to respond to questions about their symptoms, their physical, psychological, social and existential/spiritual wellbeing, and their experiences with health care. Electronic information systems are increasingly used and recommended to facilitate such QOL assessments. However, there is a need for information about how such systems are best translated into practice improvements that ultimately may improve patient- and family-centred outcomes. This study is about the implementation of an innovative, electronic health care information and practice support system, the Quality of life Assessment and Practice Support System (QPSS), into routine care provided by home care services for older adults with life-limiting illnesses and their family caregivers. Eight home care sites in Canada are participating. At each site the investigators will first adapt the QPSS to the local context and develop a plan for its local implementation. Then home care staff will be asked to use it in practice and the investigators will evaluate the process of using the QPSS and its effect on patient and family caregiver quality of life, health, and satisfaction with care as well as the cost consequences of its integration into practice. The effect of its use will be studied in a randomized trial, which is the part of the study described in this registry. Patients and their family caregivers will be randomly assigned to 1) have their home care team use the QPSS in their care or 2) not to use it, instead receiving care as usual. The effect of using the QPSS will be measured using questionnaires completed by the participating patients and family caregivers every two months. If using the QPSS improves quality of life, health, or satisfaction with care, the last stage will explore how to scale up use of the QPSS in practice and its integration with existing health information systems.
Objective: A prospective multicenter randomized controlled trial to assess the efficacy and safety of Xuebijing injection for acute exacerbation of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease(AECOPD). Methods: 254 AECOPD inpatients will be recruited in 6 hospitals in China over 2 years. They will be randomly assigned to Experimental group and Placebo group，Experimental: Xuebijing injection 50ml in 100ml of Normal Saline IV, in 80mins, per 12 hours. administration of the agent for consecutive 5 days；Placebo Comparator: Normal Saline 150ml IV, in 80mins, per 12 hours. administration of the agent for consecutive 5 days. Compare the following index between the two groups: Invasive mechanical ventilation rate, length of hospital stay, Treg cell,Th1,Th2,HLA-DR,CRP,PCT,IL-4,IL-6,IL-10,TNF-α，IFN-γ, APACHEⅡ, CAPS score.
Primary: The primary objective of this study is to evaluate the effect of the Aerobika® device on the aerosol deposition pattern of concomitant inhalation medication using FRI. Secondary: The secondary objective of this study is to evaluate the effect of the Aerobika® device on the airway volume (iVaw), lung and lobe volume (iVlobes), airway resistance (iRaw), hyperinflation, airway wall thickness (iVaww), blood vessel density (iVbv), and air trapping using FRI.
With the comparative effectiveness research methods and hospital registration study approach, the purpose of this study is to objectively record the methods, efficacy and its influencing factors of COPD commonly used treatment methods/programs (Western medicine, Traditional Chinese Medicine and Integrative Medicine) in the actual medical environment, analysis of application characteristics for the different programs, and provide the basis for its revision and promotion. It is a first registration study for COPD in China.
The purpose of this study is to evaluate formally the short term impacts of the tax policy applied to Sugar-Sweetened Beverages (SSBs) in Chile. The Impuesto Adicional a las Bebidas Analcohólicas (IABA, or "additional tax on soft drinks") in Chile was enacted in October 2014, affecting any non-alcoholic beverages to which colorants, flavourings or sweeteners have been added. For beverages above an added sugar concentration of at least 6.25 grams per 100ml (or equivalent proportion), the tax was increased from 13% to 18%, while for those below this threshold the tax was decreased to 10%, producing an 8% tax difference between these beverage groups. This impact evaluation analysis of the Chilean sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) tax will estimate the impact of increasing the tax as well as decreasing the tax on soft drinks. The study will use household level grocery purchasing data for Chile. The purchasing records are available from October 2011 to September 2015 (three years before; and one year after the implementation of the tax in October 2014). The investigators will use a series of quasi-experimental approaches to evaluate the causal impact of the SSB tax policy on consumers' behaviour as well as on industry responses in the form of pricing and price promotion decisions.
The prevalence of people living with problems due to a long-term condition (LTC) such as heart disease, diabetes or arthritis in England exceeds 15 million, and the number of those with more than one LTC continues to grow (LTCs). This population consumes a large proportion of health service resources. Advancing age and LTCs increase the likelihood of becoming housebound, this has a detrimental effect on health and quality of life. Health policy advocates a health service model of empowerment and self-care. People who live with LTCs are often very knowledgeable about how to look after their health but find it difficult to adjust their. Motivational techniques have been demonstrated to facilitate behaviour change through changing the style of communication from directive to collaborative. The use of patient-centred conversational style of communication has been shown to elicit more willingness to change than professional-led directive consultations. Community nurses are in a unique position to influence housebound patients to play a greater part in caring for themselves, preventing complications in their long-term conditions and further ill health. This study intends to test the feasibility and acceptability of training community nurses in Understanding Behaviour Change, a communication technique which uses motivational interviewing to guide patients to change their behaviour. The opportunistic use of motivational techniques to create participatory relationships between patients, community nurses potentially represents an effective intervention to enable patients with LTCs to optimise the way they care for themselves. Motivational interviewing techniques have been widely demonstrated to bring about behaviour change but have not been studied in the context of changing the style of communication between housebound patients and the professionals caring for them.