ANZCTR search results

Hidradenitis Suppurativa (HS) is a chronic skin disease that appears as pea-sized to marble-sized lumps under the skin. The lumps form most often in the armpits, under the breasts, inner thighs, groin and buttocks. HS can be painful and cause scarring and pus in affected areas. Flare-ups may be triggered by perspiration, hormonal changes (such as monthly cycles in women), humidity and heat, and friction from clothing. The objectives of this study are to determine the prevalence of HS in the Australian population and characterize the patterns of disease severity in this patient population. A cross-sectional, observational, population-based study will be used to investigate the epidemiology of HS. The study will be administered via a survey. If responses indicate that the participant potentially has HS, they will be contacted by a researcher to invite them to attend a dermatology clinic for further assessment.

Aim: To develop and pilot test an intervention to improve nurses’ abilities to manage interruptions during the administration of medications, thereby reducing medication errors and potentially, patient’s length of stay. Primary hypothesis: Interruptions associated with medication administration events will be reduced by 40%% where nurses undertake education and simulation experiences compared to nurses not receiving any education. Secondary hypothesis: There will be a 25% reduction in clinical and procedural errors during medication administration where nurses undertake and education program and / or simulation experience compared to nurses not receiving any education. Design: A CRCT is proposed to test these hypotheses as the simulation experiences, by their nature, need to be applied to groups of nurses or wards. Clinical and procedural error data will be collected at the nurse level, targeting nurses per ward. Sample and Setting: clusters of medical and surgical units and nurses (and patients) from SWSLHD hospitals form the sample. Randomisation: wards will be randomly assigned to the education or control arm. Due to the nature of the intervention, no blinding of ward nurses will be possible. Research staff involved in group allocation and analysis will be blinded to the allocation. Developing the intervention: Preliminary studies have been completed identifying sources of interruptions, extent of the problem, and use of behavioural strategies (positive and negative). Cognitive load and processing and strategies to manage the range of interrupters (nurses, doctors, patients, equipment), combined with strategies gleaned from focus group studies and observations of nurses form a 20 minute educational program including simulations.

This study will evaluate the effectiveness of Collaborative Therapy in reducing the risk of depression and anxiety in patients with chronic kidney disease and near end stage kidney disease (ESKD) who are transitioning on to dialysis treatment.

Hospitals face high levels of emergency presentations and demand for inpatient care particularly for Aboriginal Australian people from remote communities. Readmissions lead to overcrowded emergency departments and poorer patient outcomes. We will undertake a project to evaluate the efficacy of a multidimensional case-based management intervention in a regional Australian hospital with the aim of reducing hospital readmission and improving patient outcomes.

This study aims to compare the efficacy of two psychological interventions for disordered eating. Males and females, aged between 18-65 years, will be randomised into either a cognitive-behavioural guided self-help or a health at every size guided self-help condition. Participation is free and is running in Melbourne between September 2015 and September 2016.

A feasibility study for a larger, randomized, controlled trial investigating chiropractic treatment for adolescent low back pain.

Surgical Pleth Index (SPI, GE Healthcare) has been suggested to be a potentially useful parameter to assess the depth of analgesia (freedom of pain) in patients under general anaesthesia. SPI is completely risk free and requires no extra monitoring as is simply uses existing data from standard anaesthesia monitoring (from peripheral oxygen saturation sensor) to calculate a 0-100 analgesia score. Though experiments have shown that SPI scores may “respond” (i.e. going up with a painful stimulus), it is unclear whether the score may be useful to predict acute postoperative pain the recovery room. Aim of this purely observational study is to monitor SPI in 70 patients scheduled for elective surgery and to observe and record SPI data during the last approx.15 minutes of surgery until the patient wakes up from anaesthesia. This data will be compared with the first 15 minutes of 3-minutely assessed postoperative pain (0-10 numeric rating scale) in the recovery room (time counting from when patients are capable of pain self-rating). All assessments of interest for this study are standard practice of intraoperative monitoring and no additional monitoring is required for this study. The sole difference to standard practice is that the data from the anaesthesia monitor will be downloaded onto a laptop PC for analysis of the correlation between SPI and postoperative acute pain scores

While the cause of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is unknown, recent evidence points to an important role for immune dysregulation in ALS disease. In particular, a role for the suppressive arm of the immune system, directed primarily by regulatory T cells (Tregs), may slow disease progression. In this project we will conduct the first trial in ALS of a specific immune therapy, narrow band UVB phototherapy, known to increase Treg activity. Narrow band UVB phototherapy is a simple, safe and non-invasive treatment used routinely to suppress damaging immune reactions in other conditions such as psoriasis. We will determine whether UVB phototherapy is safe in ALS and whether it induces regulatory T cells. If effective, this would support a larger trial examining whether UVB phototherapy can slow the progression of disease. Slowing disease progression using phototherapy would be a major advance for this disease. If phototherapy has no effect on disease progression but can increase regulatory T cells it may be useful in combination with other neuron-regenerating treatments that are in development, by reducing immune-mediated neuron damage. The study proposed here will expand our knowledge of the role of the immune system in ALS and highlight the potential to harness its regulatory arm to slow disease progress.

This study will examine the feasibility, acceptability and potential effectiveness of dignity therapy delivered through e-health methods for people with terminal illnesses. Who is it for? You may be eligible to join this study if you are aged 18 years or above and have been diagnosed with a life-limiting condition with a prognosis of six months or less, but are expected to survive 4 weeks or more. Study details All participants in this study will receive dignity therapy. Dignity therapy is an individualised end-of-life psychotherapy that aims to reduce distress and enhance quality of life for people with terminal illnesses and their families. Participants will receive 4 to 6 one hour sessions with a psychotherapist via e-health methods, such as videoconferencing, email or chat (depending on personal preference). Participants will be asked to complete some questionnaires one week post treatment in order to provide feedback and evaluate levels of anxiety and depression, quality of life and hopefulness.

The DIVIT study is a prospective, observational study of hospitalised patients that have been diagnosed diverticulitis and diverticular disease. We will plan to identify those admitted to the Gold Coast and Robina Hospitals with the condition, and following them through their admission and discharge. In Liaison with the Acute Surgical and Gastroenterology teams at the Gold Coast Hospital will enable the Research team to identify potential candidates. We will also monitor the computer tomography (CT) scans performed at the Gold Hospital health service for diagnosis of diverticulitis that are related to presentation. We will follow their progress with use of the electronic medical records (eMR). Information about the study as well as a questionnaire looking at particular clinical factors will be given to the patients who have consented for the study. As part of standard clinical care, patients will undergo blood tests, stool tests, imaging and endoscopy. These are what is comprised of standard treatment for acute diverticulitis. There is no alteration in their clinical care. We will then analyse the collected data to determine any predictors for severe disease/ recurrent disease as stated in our aims. The data will be kept for 5 years, and at the end, will be deleted and consent forms will be destroyed. We hope to capture a sample size of around 150-200 patients over the 2 year period The purpose of the research is to identify and better understand the factors that cause diverticulitis, and distinguish between people who are more likely to develop the disease early in life and also get frequent attacks. This could have implications in aggressive approach or more conservative approach to management of acute and recurrent diverticulitis.