CClinicalTrials.gg
Status unknownNCT04440215TelestrokeUpdated Jul 21, 2021

Optimizing Patient Adherence to Stroke Rehabilitation Treatment

An interventional study of Telerehabilitation and team meetings and team care plans and Usual care in Stroke Rehabilitation, Telerehabilitation and Decision Making, Shared, sponsored by Université de Sherbrooke. Status unknown at 6 sites in Canada. Open to participants aged 18 Years and older. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2021-07-21.

Sponsored by Université de Sherbrooke · Not applicable, Interventional, and Health services research

The sponsor has not verified this record recently (last verified Jul 2021), so the status shown — last known as Recruiting — may be out of date.
Phase
Not applicable
Study type
Interventional
Enrollment
330
Allocation
Non-randomized
Ages
18 Years and older
Sex
All
01

Study summary

Stroke impacts nearly 400,000 Canadians annually. Three quarters of stroke survivors will live with minor to severe impairments or disabilities; which require rehabilitation care. Strong evidence supports beginning rehabilitation as soon as the patient's medical status has stabilized and continuing following discharge from acute care. Access to optimal services is hampered, however, by travel distances to access rehabilitation, the lack of opportunities for structured and formal interprofessional communication among service providers, and failures to engage the patient and family members in a structured decision making process. Moreover, adherence to rehabilitation treatments has been shown to be suboptimal. Many patients refuse their outpatient rehabilitation treatments outright or decrease the duration and/or frequency of their treatments over time.

The aim of this proposed mixed methods pragmatic clinical trial is to evaluate an intervention that provides patients who have experienced stroke the opportunity to return home safely after their acute hospital stay, to encourage patient (and family) engagement in their rehabilitation care, and to overcome challenges of access to patient-centered interprofessional rehabilitation care.

The proposed intervention will entail 220 patients (and family) to receive rehabilitation care through remote, live treatment sessions with an interdisciplinary group of clinicians (called telerehabilitation) versus standard of care (n = 110 patients). Five rehabilitation teams will be trained to develop rehabilitation treatment plans that engage the patient and family, while taking advantage of a telerehabilitation platform to engage the patient/family. Grounded in findings gathered through a Canadian Institute of Health Research (CIHR) funded pilot study, the primary study objective is to evaluate process, clinical outcomes and costs of telerehabilitation in comparison with usual care. Through qualitative interviews with patients and family as well as clinicians, a second objective of this pragmatic, controlled trial is to explore and describe contextual factors (both personal and environmental) that will help the delivery of care, and improve patient's outcomes while fully using technology to deliver stroke rehabilitation care.

This study represents a unique, highly relevant opportunity to minimize both knowledge and practice gaps, while producing robust, indepth data on the factors related to the effectiveness of telerehabilitation.

Read the detailed description

Stroke impacts nearly 400,000 Canadians annually. Three quarters of stroke survivors will live with minor to severe impairments or disabilities; which require rehabilitation care representing >$3.6 billion in Canadian healthcare expenditure every year. Strong evidence supports beginning rehabilitation as soon as the patient's medical status has stabilized and continuing following discharge from acute care, ideally in the patient's community. Access to optimal services is hampered, however, by travel distances to access rehabilitation, the lack of opportunities for structured and formal interprofessional communication among service providers, and failures to engage the patient and family members in a structured decision making process. Even when travel is not a barrier, adherence to rehabilitation treatments has been shown to be suboptimal. Many patients refuse their outpatient rehabilitation treatments outright or decrease the duration and/or frequency of their treatments over time.

The aim of this proposed mixed methods pragmatic clinical trial is to evaluate an intervention that provides patients who have experienced stroke the opportunity to return home safely after their acute hospital stay, to encourage patient (and family) engagement in their rehabilitation care, and to overcome challenges of access to patient-centered interprofessional rehabilitation care.

The proposed intervention will entail 220 patients (and family) to receive rehabilitation care through remote, live treatment sessions with an interdisciplinary group of clinicians (called telerehabilitation) versus standard of care (n = 110 patients). Five rehabilitation teams will be trained to develop rehabilitation treatment plans that engage the patient and family, while taking advantage of a telerehabilitation platform to engage the patient/family. Grounded in findings gathered through a CIHR funded pilot study, the primary study objective is to evaluate process, clinical outcomes and costs of telerehabilitation in comparison with usual care. Through qualitative interviews with patients and family as well as clinicians, a second objective of this pragmatic, controlled trial is to explore and describe contextual factors (both personal and environmental) that will help the delivery of care, and improve patient's outcomes while fully using technology to deliver stroke rehabilitation care.

This application has been developed by an interdisciplinary team of researchers, local healthcare providers from each region involved, two patient partners who have experienced stroke, provincial network stakeholders, and decision makers, all engaged in the successful implementation of stroke guidelines and jurisdictional strategic plans. A panel of Canadian health system knowledge users rounds out the team, to enhance the proposed intervention, to communicate the relevance and anticipated use of the findings within their province, and to foster adaptation of improved stroke care elsewhere. Finally, the study has been endorsed by several knowledge users from the Quebec Ministry of Health as well as the Quebec Heart and Stroke Foundation. Considering contrasts between rehabilitation practices and the Canadian Stroke recommendations and the lack of relevant, robust data, this study represents a unique, highly relevant opportunity to minimize both knowledge and practice gaps, while producing robust, indepth data on the factors related to the effectiveness of telerehabilitation.

02

Conditions studied

  • Stroke Rehabilitation
  • Telerehabilitation
  • Decision Making, Shared

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Keywords

  • Rehabilitation
  • Stroke
  • Adherence
  • Home
  • Telerehabilitation
  • Interprofessional shared decision making
03

In context

Stroke

7,286 studies on the registry are indexed under Stroke; 2,007 are open to participants now.

This study's planned enrollment of 330 is above the median of 50 across 5,369 interventional studies indexed under Stroke.

Browse Stroke studies →

Lead sponsor

Université de Sherbrooke is the lead sponsor of 289 studies on the registry; 68 are open to participants now.

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

Inclusion criteria

  • Have had stroke event (haemorrhagic or ischemic)
  • Are considered to be safe for home discharge by the acute/ in-patient care team (i.e. mild to moderate Functional Independence Measure score)
  • Have a relative or informal caregiver who is present in the home should physical rehabilitation treatments are required;
  • Can speak French or English.

Exclusion criteria

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Having severe cognitive decline prior to the stroke event
05

Study design

Phase
Not applicable
Primary purpose
Health services research
Allocation
Non-randomized
Intervention model
Sequential assignment
Masking
None (open label)
Enrollment
330 participants (estimated)

Study arms

  • Other
    Control

    Usual rehabilitation care (no telerehabilitation, interdisciplinary meetings not systematically organized and/or not involving a complete team of professionals)

    Other: Usual care

  • Experimental
    Telerehabilitation

    A mix of home or rehabilitation center visits, telerehabilitation and interprofessional shared decision making process.

    Other: Telerehabilitation and team meetings and team care plans

Interventions

  • OtherTelerehabilitation and team meetings and team care plans

    A mix of home or rehabilitation center visits and telerehabilitation will be planned by the rehabilitation team for a maximum of 16 weeks. Moreover, for each participant enrolled, a multidisciplinary meeting will be organised. The patient/family will participate in the meeting and the decision making process using the telerehabilitation platform. The team will generate an interprofessional individualized treatment plan, aiming for an interprofessional shared decision making process.

  • OtherUsual care

    Rehabilitation teams will be instructed to provide care as they have been doing previously. Currently, this translates into no telerehabilitation, and interdisciplinary meetings not systematically organized and/or not involving a complete team of professionals.

06

What researchers measure

Primary outcomes

  1. Patient adherence to stroke rehabilitation plan (Patient journal)

    Time spent (in minutes) doing any stroke rehabilitation exercises (online + offline). This includes (but is not limited to) physical, writing and speech therapy, and mental health-related exercises recommended by the rehabilitation professional.

    Time frame: Through intervention completion (up to 12 weeks)

  2. Change in patient adherence to stroke rehabilitation plan

    StREAM questionnaire which is a 12-item questionnaire coted on a 4-point Likert scale which measure patients' adherence to a rehabilitation program.

    Time frame: Change from baseline and 4-, 6-, 12-week post-recruitment

  3. Patient adherence to stroke rehabilitation plan (Professional perception)

    Health care professional perception of the participants' adherence to the rehabilitation program, evaluated on a 10-point scale.

    Time frame: Through intervention completion (up to 12 weeks)

Secondary outcomes

  1. Sociodemographic questionnaire

    Home questionnaire including information about sex, age, clinical information about stroke

    Time frame: At recruitment (baseline)

  2. Change in functional recovery and independence

    The modified 5-level Functional Independence Measure (FIM; 18 items) will be used. This measurement tool explores an individual's physical, psychological and social function. The tool is used to assess a patient's level of disability as well as change in patient status in response to rehabilitation or medical intervention. A lower score reflects greater disability.

    Time frame: Change from baseline and 12-week post-recruitment

  3. Change in reintegration into normal social activities

    The Reintegration to Normal Living Index (RNLI; 11 items) will be used to assess the degree to which the participants perceived their normal social activities have been impacted by the stroke event. A higher score indicates more difficulty to reintegrate normal living.

    Time frame: Change from baseline and 12-week post-recruitment

  4. Change in depression state

    The Beck Depression Inventory (Beck; 21 items) will be used to measure the severity of depression. The inventory is composed of items relating to depressive symptoms. A higher score indicates higher depression state.

    Time frame: Change from baseline and 12-week post-recruitment

  5. Use of healthcare services

    This outcome, defined as expenses related to services and long-term complications, including hospitalization and physician visits is measured with 3 different tools: 1) Section A - Use of healthcare services (16 items) of the questionnaire developed by the Institut National de Santé Publique du Québec (INSPQ), 2) information collected daily by the participant in a calendar and 3) Health administrative provincial data on use of public health services received.

    Time frame: within 12 week and 6 month post recruitment

  6. Adverse events

    Presence of adverse events related to rehabilitation (pain, dizziness, fatigue, number of falls)

    Time frame: Through intervention completion (up to 12 weeks)

  7. Perception of interprofessional care shared decision making (Patient POV)

    The Collaboration and Satisfaction About Care Decision tool (9 items) will be used. This questionnaire will be completed by the health care professionals involved in the study.

    Time frame: 12 weeks after recruitment

  8. Perception of interprofessional care shared decision making (Clinical team POV)

    The Assessment of Interprofessional Team Collaboration Scale, short version (AITCS; 23 items) will be used. This questionnaire will be completed by the health care professionals involved in the study.

    Time frame: Through study completion (up to 5 years)

  9. Statistics related to the telerehabilitation platform use

    Home questionnaire on telerehabilitation platform utilisation (who, when, duration).

    Time frame: Through intervention period (up to 3 years)

  10. Presence of intervention plan in the patient file

    A "Yes" or "No" answer to the presence of an intervention plan in the patient file

    Time frame: 12 weeks after recruitment

  11. Specific shared decision making (SDM) behaviours during decision-making (Questionnaire)

    A composite questionnaire (SURE, 4 questions; Assumed role for decision-making, 1 question; CollaboRATE, 3 questions; Quality in decision-making, 6 questions) will be used to assess the extent to which practitioners involve patients in decision making processes. Patients will be given this questionnaire following the meeting to establish their rehabilitation plan.

    Time frame: At the start of the rehabilitation period

  12. Specific shared decision making (SDM) behaviours during decision-making (Interviews)

    A randomized sample of 60 patients will be selected (50% control, 50% intervention). The meetings to establish their treatment plan will be recorded and analyzed using qualitative methods, in order to document the dynamics of the decision-making process. This qualitative section of the study will help enrich and contextualize the quantitative data collected for the other outcomes.

    Time frame: At the start of the rehabilitation period

07

Study locations

6 of 6 sites recruiting
  • Centre de réadaptation en déficience physique - Installation Châteauguay
    Châteauguay, Quebec J6J 4G7, Canada
    Recruiting
  • Centre de réadaptation en déficience physique - Installation Granby
    Granby, Quebec J2G 5L9, Canada
    Recruiting
  • Centre de réadaptation en déficiences physique - Installation Saint-Hubert
    Longueuil, Quebec J3Y 3N7, Canada
    Recruiting
  • Centre de réadaptation en déficience physique - Installation Longueuil
    Longueuil, Quebec J4J 1T2, Canada
    Recruiting
  • Centre de réadaptation en déficience physique - Installation Saint-Hyacinthe
    Saint-Hyacinthe, Quebec J2T 1N2, Canada
    Recruiting
  • Centre de réadaptation en déficience physique - Installation Vaudreuil-Dorion
    Vaudreuil-Dorion, Quebec J7V 7E4, Canada
    Recruiting
08

References and documents

Publications

  • Gaboury I, Tousignant M, Corriveau H, Menear M, Le Dorze G, Rochefort C, Vachon B, Rochette A, Gosselin S, Michaud F, Bollen J, Dean S. Effects of Telerehabilitation on Patient Adherence to a Rehabilitation Plan: Protocol for a Mixed Methods Trial. JMIR Res Protoc. 2021 Oct 28;10(10):e32134. doi: 10.2196/32134. PubMed 34709196 ↗

Individual participant data

Plan to share: No

09

Updates

Tracking since Sep 25, 2026
No changes since tracking began. The registry record was last updated on Jul 21, 2021, before this site started recording changes on Sep 25, 2026. Its history is on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗
10

Registry details

Key details

Study ID
NCT04440215
Lead sponsor
Université de Sherbrooke
Collaborators
Université de Montréal, Laval University, Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR)
Responsible party
Isabelle Gaboury (Professor, Université de Sherbrooke) — Principal investigator
First posted
Jun 19, 2020
Start date
Jul 10, 2020
Primary completion
Dec 1, 2023 (estimated)
Completion
Dec 1, 2024 (estimated)
Last update
Jul 21, 2021

Study contacts

Isabelle Gaboury, PhD
Contact
isabelle.gaboury@usherbrooke.ca
514-452-9078
Francois Bordeleau, MSc
Contact
francois.bordeleau@usherbrooke.ca
514-550-0601

Oversight

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

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