ClinicalTrials.gg
WithdrawnNCT03427008mDOTUpdated Sep 23, 2021

A Pilot Study of mDOT for Immunosuppressant Adherence in Adult Kidney Transplant Recipients

An interventional study of mHealth Intervention in Medication Adherence and Transplant; Kidney, sponsored by Johns Hopkins University. Withdrawn at 1 site in United States. Open to participants aged 22 Years and older. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2021-09-23.

Sponsored by Johns Hopkins University · Not applicable, Interventional, and Supportive care

Why this study was withdrawn
Merged IRB Created
Phase
Not applicable
Study type
Interventional
Enrollment
0
Allocation
Randomized
Ages
22 Years and older
Sex
All
01

Study summary

The investigators are interested in whether or not the use of a mobile health (mHealth) application increases the rate of immunosuppression medication adherence among adult kidney transplant recipients. The investigators aim to test this by randomly assigning transplant recipients to the intervention (use of an mHealth app to manage and track their immunosuppression regimen) or control arm (standard of care) upon discharge from their initial transplant hospitalization, and tracking medication adherence over time. The study population will be approximately 50 adult kidney transplant recipients at the Johns Hopkins Hospital.

Read the detailed description

In adult kidney transplant recipients, the leading predictor of rejection, kidney loss, and death is immunosuppressive medication nonadherence. An estimated one-third of kidney transplant recipients reportedly experience medication nonadherence, and even minor deviations from the required protocol have been shown to have negative effects. However, due to the lack of systematic measurements of adherence, the direct relationship between the level of immunosuppressive medication adherence and poor outcomes is not well understood. Therefore, the investigators believe that mHealth technologies could be a feasible way to allow clinicians and researchers to better understand baseline adherence measurements, and increase immunosuppression adherence among kidney transplant recipients.

We will use a mobile health platform that enables users to track dose-by-dose medication adherence through asynchronous, video directly observed therapy (DOT). This helps patients take their medication as prescribed and gives providers the assurance that their patients are supported and successful in treatment. DOT is the practice of watching a patient take every dose of medicine in-person, and has typically only been done in extreme cases because it can be both costly and burdensome: DOT is the standard of care for Tuberculosis treatment and has proven high-adherence rates. Through mHealth technology, DOT can be used more broadly and without added burden; emocha's technology allows this through enabling patients to use their mobile application to view their regimen, record themselves taking every dose of their medication, report side effects or symptoms, visualize their treatment progress, access educational content, and track appointments. This information is encrypted and transmitted to a HIPAA-secure web portal for providers to review. The aim of this study is to conduct a randomized control trial to compare medication adherence between patients who use the mHealth system against controls who do not.

02

Conditions studied

  • Medication Adherence
  • Transplant; Kidney

Browse trials for

Keywords

  • mHealth
  • kidney transplantation
  • medication adherence
  • video directly observed therapy
03

In context

Medication Adherence

937 studies on the registry are indexed under Medication Adherence; 159 are open to participants now.

Browse Medication Adherence studies →

Lead sponsor

Johns Hopkins University is the lead sponsor of 1,815 studies on the registry; 315 are open to participants now.

Of its 208 completed or terminated interventional studies of FDA-regulated products, 144 (69%) have results posted.

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

04

Who can participate

Ages eligible
22 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 (≥22 years)
  • Receive a kidney transplant at the Johns Hopkins Hospital

Exclusion criteria

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Non-English speaking participants
05

Study design

Phase
Not applicable
Primary purpose
Supportive care
Allocation
Randomized
Intervention model
Parallel assignment
Masking
None (open label)
Enrollment
0 participants (actual)

Study arms

  • No intervention
    Standard of Care

    Participants in the control arm will be instructed to take their immunosuppressive medications as prescribed and attend required follow-up as is standard of care, and will not receive the mHealth app.

  • Experimental
    mHealth Intervention

    Participants in the intervention arm will receive the mHealth app either while they are an inpatient post-transplant, or at their first post-transplant clinic visit. Study personnel will assist participants assigned to the mHealth intervention arm with downloading the mHealth app and explain its functioning. Participants will then use the application to aid in immunosuppressive medication adherence post-transplant.

    Other: mHealth Intervention

Interventions

  • OthermHealth Intervention

    The mHealth app will allow transplant recipients to see their medication regimen, record themselves taking every dose, report side effects or symptoms, visualize their treatment progress, access educational content, and track appointments. This information is encrypted and transmitted to a HIPAA-secure web portal for providers to review.

06

What researchers measure

Primary outcomes

  1. 12-week immunosuppression medication adherence

    After 12 weeks in the study, patients will complete the 4-item immunosuppressant therapy adherence instrument (ITAS) to determine self-reported medication adherence (scores range from 0-12 with 0 indicating very poor adherence and 12 indicating perfect adherence). Additionally, immunosuppression level trends will be tracked via electronic medical record review to determine medication adherence.

    Time frame: 12 weeks

Secondary outcomes

  1. Feasibility of using the mHealth Application as Assessed by a Semi-Structured Interview and a 17-Item Survey

    After 12 weeks in the study, participants will be asked to participate in a semi-structured phone interview in which they will answer questions regarding their medication adherence habits and their thoughts on how our mHealth technology was or was not helpful. They will also complete a 17-question post-satisfaction survey assessing their satisfaction levels with the mhealth technology. Responses in the 17-item survey are on a 7-item Likert scale, the range being Strongly Agree, Agree, Slightly Agree, Neither Agree nor Disagree, Slightly Disagree, Disagree, and Strongly Disagree.

    Time frame: 12 weeks

07

Study locations

1 site
  • Johns Hopkins Hospital
    Baltimore, Maryland 21205, United States
08

References and documents

Publications

  • De Geest S, Borgermans L, Gemoets H, Abraham I, Vlaminck H, Evers G, Vanrenterghem Y. Incidence, determinants, and consequences of subclinical noncompliance with immunosuppressive therapy in renal transplant recipients. Transplantation. 1995 Feb 15;59(3):340-7. PubMed 7871562 ↗
  • Hong JH, Sumrani N, Delaney V, Davis R, Dibenedetto A, Butt KM. Causes of late renal allograft failure in the ciclosporin era. Nephron. 1992;62(3):272-9. doi: 10.1159/000187058. PubMed 1436337 ↗
  • Nevins TE, Kruse L, Skeans MA, Thomas W. The natural history of azathioprine compliance after renal transplantation. Kidney Int. 2001 Oct;60(4):1565-70. doi: 10.1046/j.1523-1755.2001.00961.x. PubMed 11576374 ↗
  • Shoskes DA, Avelino L, Barba L, Sender M. Patient death or renal graft loss within 3 yr of transplantation in a county hospital: importance of poor initial graft function. Clin Transplant. 1997 Dec;11(6):618-22. PubMed 9408696 ↗
  • Douglas S, Blixen C, Bartucci MR. Relationship between pretransplant noncompliance and posttransplant outcomes in renal transplant recipients. J Transpl Coord. 1996 Jun;6(2):53-8. doi: 10.7182/prtr.1.6.2.x11r325882657x21. PubMed 9188358 ↗
  • Desmyttere A, Dobbels F, Cleemput I, De Geest S. Noncompliance with immunosuppressive regimen in organ transplantation: is it worth worrying about? Acta Gastroenterol Belg. 2005 Jul-Sep;68(3):347-52. No abstract available. PubMed 16268422 ↗
  • Dew MA, DiMartini AF, De Vito Dabbs A, Myaskovsky L, Steel J, Unruh M, Switzer GE, Zomak R, Kormos RL, Greenhouse JB. Rates and risk factors for nonadherence to the medical regimen after adult solid organ transplantation. Transplantation. 2007 Apr 15;83(7):858-73. doi: 10.1097/01.tp.0000258599.65257.a6. PubMed 17460556 ↗
  • De Geest S, Sabate E. Adherence to long-term therapies: evidence for action. Eur J Cardiovasc Nurs. 2003 Dec;2(4):323. doi: 10.1016/S1474-5151(03)00091-4. No abstract available. PubMed 14667488 ↗
  • Gordon EJ, Gallant M, Sehgal AR, Conti D, Siminoff LA. Medication-taking among adult renal transplant recipients: barriers and strategies. Transpl Int. 2009 May;22(5):534-45. doi: 10.1111/j.1432-2277.2008.00827.x. Epub 2009 Jan 16. PubMed 19175560 ↗
  • De Geest S, Abraham I, Moons P, Vandeputte M, Van Cleemput J, Evers G, Daenen W, Vanhaecke J. Late acute rejection and subclinical noncompliance with cyclosporine therapy in heart transplant recipients. J Heart Lung Transplant. 1998 Sep;17(9):854-63. PubMed 9773856 ↗
  • Butler JA, Roderick P, Mullee M, Mason JC, Peveler RC. Frequency and impact of nonadherence to immunosuppressants after renal transplantation: a systematic review. Transplantation. 2004 Mar 15;77(5):769-76. doi: 10.1097/01.tp.0000110408.83054.88. PubMed 15021846 ↗
  • Takemoto SK, Pinsky BW, Schnitzler MA, Lentine KL, Willoughby LM, Burroughs TE, Bunnapradist S. A retrospective analysis of immunosuppression compliance, dose reduction and discontinuation in kidney transplant recipients. Am J Transplant. 2007 Dec;7(12):2704-11. doi: 10.1111/j.1600-6143.2007.01966.x. Epub 2007 Sep 14. PubMed 17868065 ↗
  • Chisholm MA, Lance CE, Williamson GM, Mulloy LL. Development and validation of the immunosuppressant therapy adherence instrument (ITAS). Patient Educ Couns. 2005 Oct;59(1):13-20. doi: 10.1016/j.pec.2004.09.003. PubMed 16198214 ↗
  • Mellon L, Doyle F, Hickey A, Ward KD, de Freitas DG, McCormick PA, O'Connell O, Conlon P. Interventions for increasing immunosuppressant medication adherence in solid organ transplant recipients. Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2022 Sep 12;9(9):CD012854. doi: 10.1002/14651858.CD012854.pub2. PubMed 36094829 ↗

Individual participant data

Plan to share: No

09

Timeline

Tracking since Sep 25, 2026
ElapsedEstimatedEstimated, not yet reached

Ran from Sep 2018 to primary completion in Nov 2020, 25 months.

How these figures are worked out, and which studies are left out of them.

Registered
Feb 2, 2018
First posted
Feb 9, 2018
StartActual
Sep 30, 2018
Primary completionActual
Nov 12, 2020
CompletionActual
Nov 12, 2020
Last update
Sep 23, 2021
What these dates mean
Start.
When the first participant enrolled; while estimated, when the study expects to open to recruitment.
Primary completion.
When the last participant was examined or treated to collect data for the study's main question, its primary outcome. A study that stopped early gives the date its data collection stopped.
Completion.
When the last participant's last visit took place, for every outcome, secondary ones and side effects included: the end of the study. Often later than primary completion, sometimes the same day.
Actual and Est.
Actual means the registry says the date has happened. Est. (estimated) is a date the sponsor plans or expects. It can still move, and the sponsor is expected to change it to actual once it has passed.
No changes since tracking began. The registry record was last updated on Sep 23, 2021, before this site started recording changes on Sep 25, 2026. Its history is on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗
10

Registry details

Key details

Study ID
NCT03427008
Responsible party
Sponsor
First posted
Feb 9, 2018
Start date
Sep 30, 2018
Primary completion
Nov 12, 2020
Completion
Nov 12, 2020
Last update
Sep 23, 2021

Study contacts

Macey Henderson, JD,PhD
principal investigator · Johns Hopkins University
Daniel Brennan, MD
principal investigator · Johns Hopkins University

Oversight

Data monitoring committee
No
FDA-regulated drug
No
FDA-regulated device
No
View the source record on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗

Not currently enrolling

This study is withdrawn, as verified in Mar 2021. You cannot join it, but the record below documents what was studied.

Follow this study

Get an email when the registry record changes — status, dates, results — or when someone posts here.

Sign in to follow

Discussion

Questions and observations about this study, from anyone following it. Not medical advice, and not a channel to the study team — their contact details are on the registry record.

Sign in to join the discussion. Reading takes no account; posting does. You choose a display name, and a pseudonym is the default.

Nothing here yet. If you are running this trial, taking part in it, or weighing whether to, this is the place to say so.

Start the discussion