Digital Otoscope Versus Education and Feedback for Otitis Media in Young Children

Boston Children's Hospital

Status: Not yet enrolling

Conditions: Otitis Media; Antimicrobial Stewardship

Treatments: Other: Education with personalized performance feedback; Device: Use of digital otoscope

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT06731660

P00049513

Details and patient eligibility

About

Randomized controlled trial involving 40 pediatric primary care clinicians with high rates of diagnosing and treating middle ear infections. Ten enrolled clinicians will be randomly assigned to each of 4 arms for a three-month trial: 1) personalized education and feedback about proper ear infection diagnosis; 2) use of a digital otoscope; 3) both education and feedback plus use of a digital otoscope; 4) control (no intervention).

Full description

Randomized controlled trial involving 40 pediatric primary care clinicians with rates of otitis media diagnosis and antibiotic prescribing in the top quartile of the entire clinician population of the Pediatric Physicians' Organization at Children's over the previous 12 months who consent to enroll in the trial after direct outreach from the study team. Ten enrolled clinicians will be randomly assigned to each of 4 arms for a three-month intervention period: 1) personalized education and feedback about proper otitis media diagnosis following criteria from the American Academy of Pediatrics; 2) use of the Wispr digital otoscope; 3) both education and feedback plus use of the Wispr digital otoscope; 4) control (no intervention).

Enrollment: 40 estimated patients

Sex: All

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Pediatric primary care clinicians from the Pediatric Physicians' Organization at Children's with an Otitis Media Treatment Index for the previous 12 months in the top quartile of all Pediatric Physicians' Organization at Children's clinicians with at least 100 qualifying encounters in the year

Exclusion criteria

• Currently using any digital otoscope
• More than one other clinician from the same practice participating in the trial

Trial design

Primary purpose: Diagnostic

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Factorial Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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40 participants in 4 patient groups

Education with personalized performance feedback

Experimental group

Description:

Education about proper otitis media diagnosis following criteria from the American Academy of Pediatrics with personalized performance feedback on otitis media diagnosis and treatment rates delivered via email

Treatment:

Other: Education with personalized performance feedback

Use of digital otoscope

Experimental group

Description:

Use of the Wispr digital otoscope to diagnose otitis media in place of a traditional visual otoscope

Treatment:

Device: Use of digital otoscope

Education with personalized performance feedback plus use of a digital otoscope

Experimental group

Description:

Education about proper otitis media diagnosis following criteria from the American Academy of Pediatrics with personalized performance feedback on otitis media diagnosis and treatment rates delivered via email plus use of the Wispr digital otoscope to diagnose otitis media in place of a traditional visual otoscope

Treatment:

Device: Use of digital otoscope

Other: Education with personalized performance feedback

Control

No Intervention group

Description:

Control arm, no intervention