Integrated Care for Pediatric Obesity Using Telehealth

Summary

Obesity is perhaps the most urgent public health crisis in pediatrics. Thus, managing childhood obesity is a top priority among pediatricians in primary care settings. However, effective treatment typically is multidisciplinary, and most practices currently do not have the infrastructure for coordinating integrated care. With the advent of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), innovative systems for building multidisciplinary teams to provide integrated care through a patient-centered medical home will be at a strategic advantage. The use of electronic technologies for delivering health-related information or services, known as telehealth, is an innovation with the potential to streamline integrated care and transform interventions for chronic diseases. We propose a pilot study to evaluate telehealth for treating pediatric obesity in collaboration with a community practice (Wareham Pediatrics).

Patients aged 10 to 17 years who participate in the telehealth intervention study (N=40) will be randomly assigned to an "immediate" intervention group or a "wait list" control group. Subjects in the "immediate" intervention group will begin the 6-month telehealth intervention at the time of enrollment in the study and then receive general patient/family counseling from their primary care providers (PCPs) at routine office visits during a 6-month follow-up period. Those in the "wait list" control group will receive general patient/family counseling from their PCPs for 6 months followed by the telehealth intervention for 6 months. Thus, the total duration of participation in the study for each subject will be 12 months. The telehealth intervention will include dietary, physical activity, and behavioral management counseling provided by videoconferencing from the OWL clinical providers at Boston Children's Hospital to children in their homes, or at a telehealth station at Wareham Pediatrics.

Conditions

• Pediatric Obesity

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Telehealth

Telehealth visits will alternate between a dietitian and behavioral medicine provider for either 30 minutes or 1 hour. Over a 6-month period, 12 telehealth sessions will be scheduled for each participant. The dietitian will provide dietary and physical activity recommendations, and the behavioral medicine provider will counsel on strategies for achieving specific goals. Applying a Chronic Care Model, self-management support will be augmented by linkages to community resources.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Boston Children's Hospital

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Cara B. Ebbeling, PhD · Boston Children's Hospital

• Amy D Fleischman, MD · Boston Children's Hospital

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

TREATMENT

Masking

SINGLE

Model

CROSSOVER

Eligibility

Min Age

10 Years

Max Age

17 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2013-02-28

Primary Completion

2014-10-31

Completion

2015-01-31

Countries

• United States

Study Locations