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CompletedNCT01335854Updated May 22, 2014

Promoting Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) Adherence

An Early Phase 1 interventional study of Web-based Access to CPAP Data and Web-based Access to CPAP Data with Financial Incentive in Obstructive Sleep Apnea, sponsored by University of Pennsylvania. Completed at 2 sites in United States. Open to participants aged 18 Years and older. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2014-05-22.

Sponsored by University of Pennsylvania · Early Phase 1, Interventional, and Health services research

Phase
Early Phase 1
Study type
Interventional
Enrollment
135
Allocation
Randomized
Ages
18 Years and older
Sex
All
01

Study summary

The proposed research will evaluate new approaches to improving the ability of patients with obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), a breathing disorder during sleep, to use continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP), a medical device worn during sleep to treat OSA. 120 patients with newly diagnosed OSA who are being initiated on CPAP treatment will be assigned to one of 3 groups: usual care, usual care with web-based access to daily CPAP adherence, and usual care with web-based access to daily CPAP adherence and a financial incentive to use CPAP at least 4 hours/day in the first week of treatment. Measures of CPAP use, daytime sleepiness, and quality of life will evaluate whether patients provided web-based access to their daily CPAP adherence with and without financial incentive will have greater objectively measured average daily hours of CPAP use and greater improvement in functional outcomes following 3 months of treatment compared to patients receiving usual care.

The results will test the hypothesis that these behavioral interventions will improve patient adherence to CPAP during the critically important first week of treatment when many patients are deciding whether or not to use CPAP and that this initial level of adherence will be maintained over the long term despite withdrawal of the financial incentive.

Read the detailed description

This is a nested clinical study in the NIH funded research project RC2AG036592, "Developing Interactive Technology to Improve Research and Health Behavior". The purpose of the research project is to create a web-based infrastructure to accelerate research in behavioral economics to improve health. Failure to adhere to medical treatments is a major cause of poor outcomes that increase health care spending. Changing unhealthful behaviors is difficult. One barrier to behavioral change is the need to provide patients with immediate, timely information about their behavior. Individual clinicians cannot maintain the frequent contact that is required, but technology and automated feedback mechanisms can keep these issues salient for patients. Internet technology is increasingly seen as an appealing tool to overcome this barrier and promote patient self-management. Recent evidence indicates that providing patients with web-based feedback of their health status may improve adherence to treatment and outcomes.

Another barrier to behavioral change is that people need frequent reinforcement of positive behavior and need that reinforcement often at the time they are making decisions (e.g., to smoke, to overeat, to take medication). Recent studies report that the use of financial incentives is an effective strategy to changing health behavior. Incentives in the form of direct payments provide valuable positive reinforcement and have been shown to change health behavior in a variety of contexts, including weight loss, medication adherence, and smoking cessation. One criticism of this approach to changing health behaviors is whether the new behavior is sustained once the financial incentive is withdrawn.

The proposed clinical study will use the web-based infrastructure that is developed by the research project to evaluate the application of these emerging new approaches in behavioral health intervention to improving CPAP adherence and consequent treatment outcomes in patients with OSA. In the proposed research study, 120 patients with newly diagnosed OSA who are being initiated on CPAP therapy will be randomized to one of three arms: 1) usual care, 2) usual care with the ability of the participant to view reports of his/her daily CPAP use on a password protected website, and 3) usual care with the ability of the participant to view reports of his/her daily CPAP use on a password protected website combined with a daily financial incentive in the first week based of hours per day of CPAP use. The proposed health behavior interventions will 1) provide patients greater access to information about their sleep disordered breathing, and 2) allow patients to become active members of their management team. Aim 1 will determine if the proposed health behavior interventions improve average daily hours of CPAP use in the first week and following 3 months of treatment. The overall hypothesis is that these behavioral interventions will improve patient adherence to CPAP during the critically important first week of treatment when many patients are deciding whether or not to use CPAP and that this initial level of adherence will be maintained over the long term despite withdrawal of the financial incentive.

Interventions designed to improve health-related behavior will only be justified if they lead to greater improvements in clinically relevant outcomes. To determine the impact of the proposed health behavior interventions to increase CPAP adherence on treatment outcomes, Aim 2 will compare measures of daytime function following 3 months of CPAP treatment across the three groups. The results of Aim 2 will demonstrate whether improvements in CPAP adherence due to web-based feedback with or without a financial incentive result in greater improvements in clinical outcomes.

02

Conditions studied

  • Obstructive Sleep Apnea

Keywords

  • Apnea-hypopnea index
  • Continuous positive airway pressure
  • CPAP adherence
03

In context

Sleep Apnea, Obstructive

2,263 studies on the registry are indexed under Sleep Apnea, Obstructive; 465 are open to participants now.

This study's enrollment of 135 is above the median of 53 across 1,490 interventional studies indexed under Sleep Apnea, Obstructive.

Browse Sleep Apnea, Obstructive studies →

Lead sponsor

University of Pennsylvania is the lead sponsor of 1,664 studies on the registry; 236 are open to participants now.

Of its 156 completed or terminated interventional studies of FDA-regulated products, 107 (69%) have results posted.

Counted across the registry records on this site, refreshed daily.

04

Who can participate

Ages eligible
18 Years and older
Sexes eligible
All
Accepts healthy volunteers
No

Go through the criteria one by one — yes, no or not sure — and take the list to your doctor or the study team. Kept in this browser only.

Inclusion criteria

  • Adults 18 years of age or older
  • Apnea-hypopnea index (AHI) ≥ 10 events/hr on full-night in-laboratory polysomnogram (PSG) based on American Academic of Sleep Medicine (AASM) recommended scoring criteria
  • Stable medical history and no change in medications, including anti-hypertensive, thyroid-related, and lipid-lowering medications, in the previous 2 months.
  • Access to a telephone and the internet on all days of the week
  • No regular use (> 3 times/week) of sedative or hypnotic medications in the last 2 months

Exclusion criteria

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Unable or unwilling to provide informed consent
  • Are enrolled in other, ongoing clinical trials
  • Inability to return for follow-up testing
  • Previous diagnosis of another sleep disorder other than obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) (e.g., periodic limb movement disorder [≥ 15 limb movements/hr of sleep with arousal], central sleep apnea [≥ 50% of apneas on diagnostic PSG are central apneas], obesity hypoventilation syndrome, narcolepsy, or night eating syndrome
  • Previous treatment with positive airway pressure, home oxygen therapy, tracheotomy, uvulopalatopharyngoplasty, or other non-nasal surgery for OSA
  • Requiring oxygen or bilevel positive airway pressure for treatment of OSA
  • A clinically unstable medical condition as defined by a new diagnosis or change in medical management in the previous 2 months (e.g., myocardial infarction, congestive heart failure, Cheyne-Stokes breathing, unstable angina, thyroid disease, depression or psychosis, ventricular arrhythmias, cirrhosis, surgery, or recently diagnosed cancer)
  • Systolic BP > 180 mm Hg or diastolic BP > 100 mm Hg following 10 minutes at rest
  • Night shift workers in situations or occupations where they regularly experience jet lag, or have irregular work schedules by history over the last 3 months
  • Unable to perform tests due to inability to communicate verbally, inability to read and write; less than a 5th grade reading level; visual, hearing or cognitive impairment (e.g. previous head injury); or upper extremity motor deficit (e.g., previous stroke that prevents patient from using CPAP treatment)
  • Inability to use CPAP due to claustrophobia, facial pathology, etc.
05

Study design

Phase
Early Phase 1
Primary purpose
Health services research
Allocation
Randomized
Intervention model
Parallel assignment
Masking
Single (Participant)
Enrollment
135 participants (actual)

Study arms

  • No intervention
    Usual Care

    Usual care for 3 months. This consists of a phone call after one week of treatment, and clinic appointments at the sleep center following one month and three months of CPAP treatment.

  • Experimental
    Web-Access to CPAP Data

    Usual care and web-based access to CPAP adherence data for 3 months. Participants in this group will be asked to review their CPAP use daily in the first week of treatment and as desired over the next 3 months by accessing a password protected website.

    Behavioral: Web-based Access to CPAP Data

  • Experimental
    Web-Access to CPAP Data & Incentive

    Usual care and web-based access to CPAP data for 3 months with financial incentives. Participants in this group will be asked to review their CPAP use daily in the first week of treatment and as desired over the next 3 months by accessing a password protected website. Financial incentive terminated after 1 week.

    Behavioral: Web-based Access to CPAP Data with Financial Incentive

Interventions

  • BehavioralWeb-based Access to CPAP Data

    Participants will have web-based access to their CPAP usage for each 24 hours of treatment. They will be asked to view this data each day during the first week of the study, and then as frequently as they choose after the first week.

  • BehavioralWeb-based Access to CPAP Data with Financial Incentive

    Participants will have web-based access to their CPAP usage for each 24 hours of treatment. They will be asked to view this data each day during the first week of the the study, and then as frequently as they choose after the first week. There will be a payment of $30 during the first week for each day a participant uses CPAP for more than 4 hours the previous night and logs on to the website.

06

What researchers measure

Primary outcomes

  1. Average daily hours of CPAP.

    Average daily hours of CPAP use determined objectively by the mask-on time recorded by the CPAP machine.

    Time frame: 3 months

  2. The change in the mean total score on the Functional Outcome of Sleep Questionnaire.

    The change in the mean total score on the Functional Outcome of Sleep Questionnaire (FOSQ-10), a validated, disease specific quality of life questionnaire.

    Time frame: 3 months

Secondary outcomes

  1. The percentage of days that the CPAP apparatus was used and the average daily hours of CPAP use on days used.

    The percentage of days that the CPAP apparatus was used and the average daily hours of CPAP use on days used.

    Time frame: 3 months

  2. Total scores on the Epworth Sleepiness Scale (ESS) and the Medical Outcomes Study Short-Form-12 (SF-12).

    Total scores on the Epworth Sleepiness Scale (ESS) and the Medical Outcomes Study Short-Form-12 (SF-12).

    Time frame: 3 months

07

Study locations

2 sites
  • Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania
    Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104, United States
  • Lankenau Medical Center
    Wynnewood, Pennsylvania 19096, United States
08

References and documents

Publications

  • Volpp KG, Troxel AB, Pauly MV, Glick HA, Puig A, Asch DA, Galvin R, Zhu J, Wan F, DeGuzman J, Corbett E, Weiner J, Audrain-McGovern J. A randomized, controlled trial of financial incentives for smoking cessation. N Engl J Med. 2009 Feb 12;360(7):699-709. doi: 10.1056/NEJMsa0806819. PubMed 19213683 ↗
  • Volpp KG, John LK, Troxel AB, Norton L, Fassbender J, Loewenstein G. Financial incentive-based approaches for weight loss: a randomized trial. JAMA. 2008 Dec 10;300(22):2631-7. doi: 10.1001/jama.2008.804. PubMed 19066383 ↗
  • Volpp KG, Loewenstein G, Troxel AB, Doshi J, Price M, Laskin M, Kimmel SE. A test of financial incentives to improve warfarin adherence. BMC Health Serv Res. 2008 Dec 23;8:272. doi: 10.1186/1472-6963-8-272. PubMed 19102784 ↗
09

Updates

Tracking since Sep 25, 2026
No changes since tracking began. The registry record was last updated on May 22, 2014, before this site started recording changes on Sep 25, 2026. Its history is on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗
10

Registry details

Key details

Study ID
NCT01335854
Responsible party
Sponsor
First posted
Apr 14, 2011
Start date
Sep 2011
Primary completion
Aug 2013
Completion
Aug 2013
Last update
May 22, 2014

Study contacts

Samuel T Kuna, MD
principal investigator · University of Pennsylvania

Oversight

Data monitoring committee
No
View the source record on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗

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This study is completed, as verified in Mar 2012. You cannot join it, but the record below documents what was studied.

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