NCT07265453

A Family-centred Approach Enhancing Cardiovascular Health in Ugandan Adolescents and Their Families

A Family Centred Approach to Enhance Lifestyle Change and Behavioural Modification for Prevention of Cardiovascular Diseases Among Adolescents and Their Families in Uganda

• Status: Recruiting
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 1,280 (estimated)
• Sponsor: MRC/UVRI and LSHTM Uganda Research Unit · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 10 Years – 19 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Accepted

Summary

The FaCe-D Study, with funding from the Canadian Institute for Health Research (CIHR) through Global Alliance for Chronic Diseases (GACD) aims to adapt and implement an evidence-based family centred approach (FCA) to prevent cardiovascular diseases (CVD) among adolescents and their families. This 5-year implementation science study will be conducted in 16 villages in Jinja district and another 16 in Kampala beginning April 2024 to evaluate the effectiveness of FCA in reducing the risk of CVD in Uganda and to assess feasibility, adoption, while measuring the costs of implementation. The study will be implemented by a group of researchers from MRC/UVRI \& LSHTM, University of British Columbia (Canada), TASO (Uganda) and University of California San Francisco (UCSF) - USA with guidance from the Ministry of Health - Uganda.

Detailed description

Uganda faces a growing challenge of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) alongside the existing burden due to HIV/AIDS. By NCDs, the investigators refer to common conditions such as diabetes, cancers, and cardiovascular diseases (including hypertension, stroke, and heart attack). About 38.8% of the population in Uganda has raised blood pressure (pre-hypertension), 34% in urban and 22% in rural areas have hypertension. The risk factors, such as unhealthy diet and physical inactivity, responsible for the development of these NCDs are modifiable and related to behaviour. The investigators propose to adapt, implement and evaluate a family-centred approach to enhance behaviour change among adolescents and their families. Why focus on Adolescents? The investigators recognize that adolescence is a critical stage marked by significant physical, cognitive, and social changes and time to adopt behaviour that extends into adulthood. Previous studies have shown that even if the signs and symptoms of cardiovascular disease appear in adulthood, the process starts earlier during adolescence. The investigators aim to intervene by working with adolescents and families to change their behaviors and adopt a healthier diet and engage in recommended level of physical. The iHealth T2D study that was conducted in parts of Asia and the United Kingdom showed that using the family centered approach and working closely with community health care workers led to reduction in body weight, blood pressure and thus reducing the risk of NCDs among the Asian population. The investigators will adapt the iHealth T2D study intervention to the Ugandan context, considering the specific features of the setting, village health team responsibilities and content of the education material. The intervention will promote physical activity and healthy eating habits among families. The study comprises three phases; a) formative phase which is focusing on adapting the intervention, b) Implementation phase, to implement the adapted intervention and c) evaluation phase, assessing effectiveness and the overall process of the adapted intervention.

Conditions

• Adolescent Behavior
• Lifestyle Modification
• Cardiovascular Disease Other

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
BEHAVIORAL	The immediate (treatment) arm, will receive the FaCe-D intervention comprising of 'HOME VISITS, DIET, PHYSICAL ACTIVITY AND HEALTH MESSAGING	The participants will receive the FaCe-D intervention comprising of dietary and exercise interventions delivered by Village Health Teams (VHTs)
OTHER	Control Arm - standard of care	Arm Description: They will continue to receive standard care with VHts performing their usual roles of health promotion for both communicable and non-communicable diseases as outlined by the Ministry of Health guidelines. This standard care involves visits by the VHT at least once a quarter to check hygiene and environment, children's immunisation status and other health promotion activities. The VHT may or may not involve the entire family/household.

Timeline

• Start date: 2025-07-05
• Primary completion: 2027-01-01
• Completion: 2028-01-01
• First posted: 2025-12-04
• Last updated: 2025-12-12

Locations

2 sites across 1 country: Uganda