NCT04456062

Using Caring Contacts to Reduce Psychiatric Morbidity Following Hospitalization During the COVID-19 Pandemic

• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 102 (actual)
• Sponsor: Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 18 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Not accepted

Summary

Subjects will be recently discharged patients from Sunnybrook Inpatient Psychiatry Unit. Subjects will be randomized in a 1:1 ratio to either the Caring Contact intervention or usual care. 75 subjects will be enrolled in each arm. In additional to usual discharge-related care, subjects in the caring contact group will receive brief emails that convey a message of hope and provide resources. These emails will be sent on days 4, 21, and 56 post-discharge. The specific content of these emails will be pre-determined varying slightly by time point. In contrast, the control group will only receive usual discharge-related care, including discharge planning and also a sheet of resources normally provided to patients. A widely used and validated measure will be employed to assess depression and anxiety symptoms. The 25-item self-report Hopkins Symptom Checklist will be emailed to all subjects at baseline, day 4, 21, and 56 post-discharge, along with the Caring Contact communication. It is hypothesized that there will be a significantly greater reduction in mental health symptoms among patients receiving Caring Contacts compared to those who receive usual care.

Conditions

• Psychiatric Hospitalization

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
OTHER	Caring Contacts	Caring Contacts are brief email communications sent to the patient post-discharge. They convey messages of hope, support, promote a sense of belonging, and provide information on resources for care. They are not written uniquely for each patient but are purposefully crafted to intervene on those specific vulnerabilities that form the core of many patients' experiences with intense emotional distress and suicidal thoughts.

Timeline

• Start date: 2020-08-04
• Primary completion: 2021-07-31
• Completion: 2021-07-31
• First posted: 2020-07-02
• Last updated: 2022-08-24

Locations

1 site across 1 country: Canada