Parent-Reported Symptom Assessments in Children Taking Multiple Medications

Chronic Disease Clinical Trial

— PRSA  

Official title:

Enhancing Medication Safety in Children With Polypharmacy Using Parent- Reported Symptom Assessments

Clinical Trial Details — Status: Completed

Administrative data

• NCT number: NCT03849066
• Other study ID #: 16-2538
• Secondary ID: 5K23HD091295
• Status: Completed
• Start date: April 1, 2019
• Est. completion date: August 1, 2022

Study information

• Verified date: January 2023
• Source: University of Colorado, Denver
• Contact: n/a
• Is FDA regulated: No
• Study type: Observational

Clinical Trial Summary

This study plans to learn about how to measure symptoms (like tiredness or rash) in children with special healthcare needs who take 5 or more medications. Sometimes symptoms change in severity over time or new symptoms develop. This can happen after a new medication is started. This can also happen after the dose of an existing medication is changed. The Investigators believe that parents will be able to provide the best assessment of any symptoms that their child might be experiencing. This study asks parents to report any symptoms their child is currently experiencing.

Description:

An increasing number of children with complex chronic conditions (CCCs) who have intractable illnesses or multi-organ dysfunction are exposed to daily polypharmacy. Parents of children with polypharmacy often administer 5 or more medications each day, sometimes for months, including high-risk medications prescribed by many different specialists in multiple settings of care. While medications can be life-saving, polypharmacy increases the risk of additive adverse effects, drug-drug interactions, and can lead to serious adverse drug events (ADEs). Pediatric ADEs result in over 4.3 million estimated ambulatory visits annually, including >150,000 pediatric emergency room visits. Despite the risks associated with polypharmacy, little is known about how polypharmacy escalates and how polypharmacy should be managed. To enable children to thrive at home using medications while minimizing unwanted symptoms, this proposal aims to implement a prospective, parent-reported symptom assessment system to guide and monitor pharmaceutical care for high-risk children. Strategies to improve recognition of problematic symptoms will have a substantial impact on the health of children.

Recruitment information / eligibility

• Status: Completed
• Enrollment: 136
• Est. completion date: August 1, 2022
• Est. primary completion date: August 1, 2022
• Accepts healthy volunteers: No
• Gender: All
• Age group: 1 Day to 17 Years

Eligibility

Inclusion Criteria:

• Neurological impairment

• 5 or more scheduled medications

• English- or Spanish-speaking

Exclusion Criteria:

• Receives primary care outside outside of the Children's Hospital Colorado Network of Care

Related Conditions & MeSH terms

• Chronic Disease
• Disease
• Nervous System Diseases
• Neurologic Disorder
• Pediatric Disorder

Intervention

Other:
• Parent-Reported Symptom Assessment
As the basis for PRSA, the investigator will use the PediQuest Memorial Symptom Assessment Scale (PQ-MSAS), which is an adapted pediatric-specific version of the validated adult MSAS that assesses 28 physical and psychological symptoms over the past week. The study instrument is designed to be completed by a full-proxy parent, and 2 versions tailored for specific age groups are available (0-3, 3-18 years-old). Spanish versions are available for both instruments. The PQ-MSAS contains 28 symptom items, each with 4-point scores for domains of frequency, severity, and extent of bother. Based on these components, a global symptom score and individual symptom scores can be calculated (0-100 scale, with 100 being the worst).

Locations

Country	Name	City	State
United States	Children's Hospital Colorado	Aurora	Colorado

Sponsors (2)

Lead Sponsor	Collaborator
University of Colorado, Denver	Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD)

Country where clinical trial is conducted

United States, 

References & Publications (13)

Berry JG, Poduri A, Bonkowsky JL, Zhou J, Graham DA, Welch C, Putney H, Srivastava R. Trends in resource utilization by children with neurological impairment in the United States inpatient health care system: a repeat cross-sectional study. PLoS Med. 2012 Jan;9(1):e1001158. doi: 10.1371/journal.pmed.1001158. Epub 2012 Jan 17. — View Citation

Dussel V, Orellana L, Soto N, Chen K, Ullrich C, Kang TI, Geyer JR, Feudtner C, Wolfe J. Feasibility of Conducting a Palliative Care Randomized Controlled Trial in Children With Advanced Cancer: Assessment of the PediQUEST Study. J Pain Symptom Manage. 2015 Jun;49(6):1059-69. doi: 10.1016/j.jpainsymman.2014.12.010. Epub 2015 Jan 30. — View Citation

Feinstein J, Dai D, Zhong W, Freedman J, Feudtner C. Potential drug-drug interactions in infant, child, and adolescent patients in children's hospitals. Pediatrics. 2015 Jan;135(1):e99-108. doi: 10.1542/peds.2014-2015. Epub 2014 Dec 15. — View Citation

Feinstein JA, Feudtner C, Blackmer AB, Valuck RJ, Fairclough DL, Holstein J, Gregoire L, Samay S, Kempe A. Parent-Reported Symptoms and Medications Used Among Children With Severe Neurological Impairment. JAMA Netw Open. 2020 Dec 1;3(12):e2029082. doi: 10 — View Citation

Feinstein JA, Feudtner C, Kempe A, Orth LE. Anticholinergic Medications and Parent-Reported Anticholinergic Symptoms in Neurologically Impaired Children. J Pain Symptom Manage. 2023 Feb;65(2):e109-e114. doi: 10.1016/j.jpainsymman.2022.10.013. Epub 2022 No — View Citation

Feinstein JA, Feudtner C, Kempe A. Adverse drug event-related emergency department visits associated with complex chronic conditions. Pediatrics. 2014 Jun;133(6):e1575-85. doi: 10.1542/peds.2013-3060. Epub 2014 May 19. — View Citation

Feinstein JA, Feudtner C, Valuck RJ, Fairclough DL, Holstein JA, Samay S, Kempe A. Identifying Important Clinical Symptoms in Children With Severe Neurological Impairment Using Parent-Reported Outcomes of Symptoms. JAMA Pediatr. 2020 Nov 1;174(11):1114-11 — View Citation

Feinstein JA, Feudtner C, Valuck RJ, Kempe A. The depth, duration, and degree of outpatient pediatric polypharmacy in Colorado fee-for-service Medicaid patients. Pharmacoepidemiol Drug Saf. 2015 Oct;24(10):1049-57. doi: 10.1002/pds.3843. Epub 2015 Aug 7. — View Citation

Feinstein JA, Friedman H, Orth LE, Feudtner C, Kempe A, Samay S, Blackmer AB. Complexity of Medication Regimens for Children With Neurological Impairment. JAMA Netw Open. 2021 Aug 2;4(8):e2122818. doi: 10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2021.22818. — View Citation

Feinstein JA, Morrato EH, Feudtner C. Prioritizing Pediatric Drug Research Using Population-Level Health Data. JAMA Pediatr. 2017 Jan 1;171(1):7-8. doi: 10.1001/jamapediatrics.2016.3462. No abstract available. — View Citation

Feinstein JA, Orth LE. Making polypharmacy safer for children with medical complexity. J Pediatr. 2022 Oct 15:S0022-3476(22)00899-X. doi: 10.1016/j.jpeds.2022.10.012. Online ahead of print. No abstract available. — View Citation

Marquez C, Thompson R, Feinstein JA, Orth LE. Identifying opportunities for pediatric medication therapy management in children with medical complexity. J Am Pharm Assoc (2003). 2022 Sep-Oct;62(5):1587-1595.e3. doi: 10.1016/j.japh.2022.04.005. Epub 2022 A — View Citation

Wolfe J, Orellana L, Cook EF, Ullrich C, Kang T, Geyer JR, Feudtner C, Weeks JC, Dussel V. Improving the care of children with advanced cancer by using an electronic patient-reported feedback intervention: results from the PediQUEST randomized controlled trial. J Clin Oncol. 2014 Apr 10;32(11):1119-26. doi: 10.1200/JCO.2013.51.5981. Epub 2014 Mar 10. — View Citation

* Note: There are 13 references in all — Click here to view all references

Outcome

Type	Measure	Description	Time frame	Safety issue
Primary	Global Symptom Score	As the basis for PRSA, we used the PediQuest Memorial Symptom Assessment Scale (PQ-MSAS), which is an adapted pediatric-specific version of the validated adult MSAS that assesses 28 physical and psychological symptoms over the past week. The study instrument is designed to be completed by a full-proxy parent, and 2 versions tailored for specific age groups are available (0-3, 3-18 years-old). Spanish versions are available for both instruments. The PQ-MSAS contains 28 symptom items, each with 4-point scores for domains of frequency, severity, and extent of bother. Based on these components, a global symptom score and individual symptom scores can be calculated (0-100 scale, with 100 being the worst).	Baseline
Secondary	Medication Count	Prescription and over-the-counter medications were counted at the time of the visit. To reflect parent-facing medication complexity, we excluded clinic-administered or inpatient-administered medications (eg, vaccines or botulinum toxin injections).	Baseline
Secondary	Medication Regimen Complexity Index Score (MRCI)	MRCI scores were calculated automatically from EHR data using the MRCI tool, scoring instructions, and examples that are publicly available. Conceptually, the total MRCI score for a CMR is the sum of 3 weighted subscores (dosage form, dose frequency, and specialized instructions), with increasing weights corresponding to the difficulty of administration. The minimum total MRCI score for a participant using a single medication is 1.5. The total MRCI score has no upper limit because it is dependent on the total number of medications, and higher MRCI scores indicate more-complex regimens.	Baseline