Assessing the Acceptability and Feasibility of COMPASS

Summary

Heart failure (HF) is a complex clinical syndrome characterized by the inability of the heart to pump an adequate amount of blood. Heart failure affects patients' ability to carry out even simple activities of daily living and therefore has a negative psychological impact. Many studies reported that anxiety and depression are prevalent among HF patients and it is being associated with high morbidity, mortality and costs. Community HF patients who are diagnosed with depression are usually referred for Improving Access for Psychological Therapies (IAPT). The IAPT services have long waiting lists and many patients in the community still do not have access to IAPT. IAPT (2017) found web-based interventions for psychological therapies for emotional disorders such as depression and anxiety to be as effective as the traditional interventions and yielded positive mental health outcomes.

In this current study, the feasibility and acceptability of the proposed COMPASS web-based intervention will be examined. COMPASS is a web-based therapy (online CBT program) designed for the management of depression and anxiety for patients with long term conditions such as heart failure.

This study will be conducted into three parts and mainly include one-to-one interviews. First, the researcher will use an approach called "think aloud" which is a specific type of interview that allows us to observe the participant while using the proposed COMPASS online using Microsoft Teams. The participant will be asked to log into the COMPASS website and talk to the researcher continuously as possible about what they are thinking or what comes into their mind as they are using the COMPASS website. Following this interview, the researcher will ask the participant to use COMPASS from any internet-connected device for four weeks with weekly follow-up telephone calls. One month after the completion of COMPASS, the researcher will interview the participants.

Conditions

• Heart Failure
• Depression
• Anxiety

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

COMPASS

COMPASS is a web-based intervention (online CBT program) that was developed for managing illness-related anxiety and depression in patients with long-term conditions (LTC) (https://compass-ltc.org/). An example of the patient login page can be viewed here: www.compass-southwark.co.uk. COMPASS aims to support people in managing the challenges of living with a long-term condition. COMPASS is based on research which shows the benefit of combining mental and physical healthcare. The proposed COMPASS program consists of 11 online sessions for patients to work through over approximately 12 weeks. The sessions can be worked through in any order the patient would like. The sessions are split into four quadrants - North, East, South and West - which explore different elements of managing the LTC challenges that were identified from the evidence-based systematic review. Sessions contain information, interactive tasks, goal setting and patient stories.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• King's College London

  lead OTHER

Study Design

Allocation

NA

Purpose

OTHER

Masking

NONE

Model

SINGLE_GROUP

Eligibility

Min Age

18 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2021-11-11

Primary Completion

2022-04-01

Completion

2022-04-01

Countries

• United Kingdom

Study Locations