Lower My Drinking: Clinical efficacy and implementation perceptions
Research type
Research Study
Full title
A MIXED METHODS OUTCOMES STUDY EVALUATING THE EFFICACY OF THE ‘LOWER MY DRINKING’ APP AND ANALYSING STAKEHOLDER PERCEPTIONS
IRAS ID
270940
Contact name
Stephanie Dugdale
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Breaking Free Group
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 1 months, 0 days
Research summary
Between 2017-2018, approximately 76000 people in England were treated for problematic drinking, and 337870 hospital admissions were related to alcohol consumption. The cost of alcohol-related harm is estimated to be approximately £47 billion. Despite the benefits of alcohol screening measures and brief advice within healthcare services there are questions as to the real-world applicability of this outside of research settings, and the implementation of brief advice in primary care remains low. This may be due to several barriers to implementation, including a lack of time, a lack of resources and training, discomfort with discussing alcohol, and limited knowledge of the risk factors associated with use. One way to overcome these person-related barriers may be through digital methods. Recently, an alcohol-specific mobile application has been developed, Lower My Drinking (LMD). This app is suitable for those who are drinking at hazardous (increasing risk) or harmful (higher risk) levels. The current study aims to test and explore the effectiveness of the LMD mobile application for users as provided by healthcare professionals in Sandwell.
Clinical outcomes around successful alcohol reduction and broader psychosocial functioning will be ascertained via analyses of data captured by the LMD app. Ethical approval to use this database for research purposes has already been granted by London South-East REC (Ref: 18/LO/0286, date: 29/03/2018). Qualitative feedback on the app and the implementation of this form of support will then be gathered from approximately 15 service users and 15 healthcare professionals. Service users will be offered the opportunity to take part in face-to-face interviews or to complete an online questionnaire. Healthcare professionals will also be offered the opportunity to take part in telephone or face-to-face interviews. It is this qualitative aspect of the study that this ethics application primarily seeks obtain approvals for, given the LMD database has already been approved.
REC name
West Midlands - Coventry & Warwickshire Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
19/WM/0349
Date of REC Opinion
10 Jan 2020
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion