mHealth Intervention for Increasing COVID-19 Prevention Practices With Urban Refugee and Displaced Youth in Uganda

Summary

Uganda hosts 1.4 million refugees, making it Sub-Saharan Africa's largest refugee host community and the third largest globally. Adolescents and young people (AYP) comprise half of the world's 70.8 million forcibly displaced persons, yet they are understudied in pandemics, including in COVID-19. Poverty, overcrowded living conditions, and poor sanitation likely elevate forcibly displaced persons' COVID-19 risks by limiting their ability to practice mitigation strategies. There continue to be significant knowledge gaps regarding the implementation and effectiveness of behaviour change interventions on improving COVID-19 prevention practices (i.e. hand and respiratory hygiene, physical distancing). mHealth (healthcare delivered by mobile phones) is cost-effective, aligned with how youth learn and socialize, vital for physical distancing, and has been used for COVID-19 messaging in other low- and middle-income countries. Nested within an ongoing HIV self-testing cluster-randomized trial, this study aims to develop, implement, and evaluate the effectiveness of an mHealth intervention in increasing COVID-19 prevention practices with displaced/refugee AYP aged 16-24 in Kampala, Uganda. Participants will be enrolled in a 8-week mHealth social group intervention program that is informed by the RANAS (Risks, Attitudes, Norms, Abilities, and Self-Regulation) approach to Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene. Using a pre-test/post-test design, this study will assess changes in participants' self-efficacy (e.g. ability, confidence, adherence) in COVID-19 prevention practices.

Conditions

• Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice
• Covid19

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Kukaa Salama: mHealth intervention

Kukaa Salama is a 8-week social group program of COVID-19 prevention messaging, which includes sending informational SMS once per week and holding secure group discussions on COVID-19 prevention. Weekly SMS messages will focus on COVID-19 knowledge, including information about transmission, hand washing, respiratory hygiene (coughing and sneezing in ways that won't spread germs), face masks, and physical distancing. Participants can also respond to the SMS with any questions about COVID-19, and the study team will respond with further information and/or additional resources. Weekly group chats will be administered using the customized WelTel platform, and will focus on discussions of how participants can apply and practice the information on COVID-19 prevention in their daily lives. Each group chat will be composed of 15-20 participants, and will be facilitated by a research assistant in Kampala as well as a peer navigator.

DEVICE

Face Mask + Soap

Participants will be offered the opportunity to pick up a parcel that contains a face mask, bar of soap, and a small parcel of food from the partner agency YARID.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• University of Toronto

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Carmen H Logie, PhD · University of Toronto, Canada

Study Design

Allocation

NA

Purpose

PREVENTION

Masking

NONE

Model

SINGLE_GROUP

Eligibility

Min Age

16 Years

Max Age

24 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2021-02-01

Primary Completion

2021-08-20

Completion

2021-10-31

Countries

• Canada

Study Locations