NCT05787847

Financial Incentives to Promote Stimulant Abstinence in a Community-Based Syringe Exchange Program

• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 27 (actual)
• Sponsor: University of Vermont · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 18 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Accepted

Summary

The goal of this randomized control pilot study is to learn about a financial incentives intervention among individuals who use stimulants and take part in a community-based syringe exchange program. The main question it aims to answer is how financial incentives for not using stimulants will impact stimulant use. Participants in the experimental group will have the opportunity to earn financial incentives for providing a negative urine sample for stimulants using a point-of-care test, which indicates abstinence from stimulant use, along with health education on the health risks of stimulant use and substance injection. Researchers will compare the experimental group to the control group who will receive health education on the health risks of stimulants use and injection.

Detailed description

The investigators are proposing a two condition, parallel groups, randomized control pilot study to evaluate the efficacy of a financial incentives intervention among individuals who use stimulants and take part in a community-based syringe exchange program. The study design will include recruiting service recipients who already participate in programs offered by a syringe exchange program.The experimental group will have the opportunity to earn financial incentives contingent on providing a negative urine sample for stimulants using a point-of-care test, which indicates abstinence from stimulant use, in addition to health education on the health risks of stimulant use and substance injection. The control group will receive health education on the health risks of stimulants use and injection. All participants will participate in their syringe exchange services as usual. The investigators chose the health education as the control because participants across both conditions already receive the services provided by the syringe exchange program. Moreover, this control condition will help control for a potential type of between-groups variability.

Conditions

• Stimulant Use

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
BEHAVIORAL	Incentives for Abstinence	Participants in the incentives for abstinence condition will have the opportunity to earn financial incentives for abstaining from stimulant use.
BEHAVIORAL	Health Education	The Health Education condition is based on a previous intervention used as a control in a number of other studies. Sessions consist of an educational program addressing a variety of health, wellness, and lifestyle topics adapted from a previously implemented wellness manual.

Timeline

• Start date: 2024-02-14
• Primary completion: 2024-07-30
• Completion: 2024-07-30
• First posted: 2023-03-28
• Last updated: 2025-09-17
• Results posted: 2025-09-17

Locations

1 site across 1 country: United States