Digital Interventions for Detection and Reduction of Moral Distress

NCT05001542 | Completed

• 2 other identifiers: 21-066CPCA-0592
• Study Type: interventional
• Target: 15
• Locations: 1 country
• Sites: 1

Brief Summary

Stress, anxiety, distress and depression are exceptionally high among healthcare workers at the frontline of the COVID-19 pandemic. Factors underlying distress and resilience are unknown and there are no evidence based interventions to impact the mental wellbeing of frontline healthcare workers. This study will evaluate a novel virtual reality platform to gather the "distress experience" of frontline healthcare workers at Unity Health Toronto in real time during the ongoing COVID pandemic by developing and showing feasibility of digital technology (Virtual Reality (VR) and mobile app) as a digital platform to understand the causes and ultimately reduce the moral distress of healthcare providers during the COVID-19 pandemic. The project will develop innovations which can be used for future pandemics and other contexts prone to producing moral distress and injury.

Conditions

Moral Injury; Distress, Emotional

Keywords

Depression; Anxiety; Stress; Moral Injury; Moral Distress; Loneliness

Outcome Measures

Primary Outcomes (1)

• Feasibility evaluation of the virtual reality environment

  The primary outcome measure will be a comparison of MIOS (Moral Injury Outcome Scale) and PSS (Perceived Stress Scale) scores before and after watching an educational video on moral injury; feasibility of this platform will be assessed based on a feasibility questionnaire and changes in score.

  60 minutes (during the intervention)

Secondary Outcomes (1)

• Feasibility evaluation of a mobile platform to understand the continuum of stress and moral distress.

  Up to 8 weeks

Study Arms (1)

Experimental Arm

EXPERIMENTAL

VR simulation exercise with a digital follow-up component to help assess the physiological and psychological indicators of moral distress

Other: Educational moral injury video

Interventions

Educational moral injury video OTHER

Educational video that addresses the identification of moral injury and distress in frontline healthcare workers during COVID-19; offers available interventions at the levels of individual, team and organization

Experimental Arm

Eligibility Criteria

• Age: 18 Years+
• Sex: all
• Healthy Volunteers: Yes
• Age Groups: Adult (18-64), Older Adult (65+)

You may qualify if:

• Staff or healthcare providers working at Unity Health Toronto
• years of age or older
• Must own a mobile phone running Android Version 6.0 and higher, or an iPhone 6 running OS 14 and higher)
• \- Non-Unity Health Toronto staff

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Unity Health Toronto: lead
• Toronto Metropolitan University: collaborator
• University of Toronto: collaborator
• University of Ontario Institute of Technology: collaborator
• McMaster University: collaborator

Study Sites (1)

St. Michael's Hospital

Toronto, Ontario, M5B 1W8, Canada

Location

Related Publications (2)

• Espinola CW, Nguyen B, Torres A, Sim W, Rueda A, Beavers L, Campbell DM, Jung H, Lou W, Kapralos B, Peter E, Dubrowski A, Krishnan S, Bhat V. Digital Interventions for Stress Among Frontline Health Care Workers: Results From a Pilot Feasibility Cohort Trial. JMIR Serious Games. 2024 Jan 9;12:e42813. doi: 10.2196/42813.

  PMID: 38194247 DERIVED

• Nguyen B, Torres A, Sim W, Kenny D, Campbell DM, Beavers L, Lou W, Kapralos B, Peter E, Dubrowski A, Krishnan S, Bhat V. Digital Interventions to Reduce Distress Among Health Care Providers at the Frontline: Protocol for a Feasibility Trial. JMIR Res Protoc. 2022 Feb 16;11(2):e32240. doi: 10.2196/32240.

  PMID: 34871178 DERIVED

MeSH Terms

Conditions

Stress Disorders, Post-Traumatic; Depression; Anxiety Disorders

Condition Hierarchy (Ancestors)

Stress Disorders, Traumatic; Trauma and Stressor Related Disorders; Mental Disorders; Behavioral Symptoms; Behavior

Study Officials

• Venkat Bhat, MD MSc

  Unity Health Toronto

  PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR

Study Design

• Study Type: interventional
• Phase: not applicable
• Allocation: NA
• Masking: NONE
• Purpose: OTHER
• Intervention Model: SINGLE GROUP
• Sponsor Type: OTHER
• Responsible Party: PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR
• PI Title: Principal Investigator

Model Details: Users will go through a VR experiment before and after a brief interventional informative video describing moral distress. The VR experiment is a simulation that will lead the participant through a stressful experience about moral distress during the COVID-19 pandemic. Before, during, and after the experiment, active and physiological data will be collected from the participant to monitor their level of acute distress and health, respectively. Following the experiment, active and passive data will be collected on each user through the investigators' mobile platform (DiiG) for longitudinal monitoring of moral distress and injury.

Study Record Dates

• First Submitted: July 28, 2021
• First Posted: August 12, 2021
• Study Start: May 31, 2021
• Primary Completion: August 30, 2021
• Study Completion: August 30, 2021
• Last Updated: October 7, 2021

Record last verified: 2021-10

Data Sharing

• IPD Sharing: Will not share

Locations

CA (1)