Occupational Therapy Led Social Prescription for People With Parkinson Disease

Summary

Loneliness is an epidemic that the U.S. Surgeon General implored must be addressed by society as a whole. Increased loneliness (i.e., distressing feelings of isolation) in people with Parkinson's disease (PD) has a pervasive impact and is associated with worsened motor and non-motor symptoms, and quality of life. The investigators expect that individuals participating socially in the community would experience less loneliness. However, for individuals with PD participating in community-based group exercise programs, the investigators have found that over one third still report being lonely. Therefore, an evidence-based program needs to be added to address a significant problem of loneliness for people with PD-and occupational therapy is the leading discipline to add the intervention because social participation is one of eight occupations that an occupational therapist is focused on optimizing. The chief executive officer at the Parkinson Association of the Rockies (PAR), members of the Colorado State University Occupational Therapy Department, and members of the University of Colorado's Parkinson's Exercise Research Consortium have teamed up to address pervasive loneliness.

Social prescription is a prime evidence-based intervention to add to existing PD community-based exercise classes because it has been shown to reduce loneliness. For this project, the investigators detect participants in the 'lonely' range through a standardized assessment. The investigators will work with PAR staff who will refer individuals identifying as 'lonely' to an occupational therapist, who will complete an individualized occupational profile and write the appropriate social prescription from 11 different interventions (examples include: intergenerational intervention, animal companions, physical activity, occupational therapy) from established community resources recommended for social prescription. The proposed project is designed with three primary goals: (1) determine the reach of the social prescription program, (2) evaluate the effectiveness of the program at one site, and (3) determine implementation strategies for scalability.

Conditions

• Parkinson Disease

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Occupational Therapy Led Social Prescription

The intervention includes encouragement to participate in the co-designed social prescription with 6 monthly sessions with an occupational therapist or occupational therapy doctoral student.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• American Occupational Therapy Foundation

  collaborator OTHER

• Colorado State University

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Laura A Swink, PhD · Colorado State University

Study Design

Allocation

NA

Purpose

SUPPORTIVE_CARE

Masking

NONE

Model

SINGLE_GROUP

Eligibility

Min Age

18 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2024-08-13

Primary Completion

2026-06-30

Completion

2026-06-30

Countries

• United States

Study Locations