Essential Coaching for Every Mother in Tanzania (ECEMTZ)

IWK Health Centre

Status: Enrolling

Conditions: Parenting Self Efficacy; Postpartum Anxiety; Newborn Knowledge; Postpartum Depression; Breastfeeding Self-Efficacy

Treatments: Behavioral: Essential Coaching for Every Mother

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT05362305

ECEMTZ

Details and patient eligibility

About

The purpose of this study is to evaluate a text message intervention called Essential Coaching for Every Mother in Tanzania to improve mothers' access to essential newborn care information during the immediate six-week postnatal period.

Full description

This is a 2-group parallel arm randomized controlled trial. Participants will be randomized into either the intervention or a control group. No changes to in-person care will occur.

This study will be conducted in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania with mothers recruited from a Tanzanian postnatal ward who have recently given birth at four different hospitals. Participants in the intervention group will start receiving the Essential Coaching for Every Mother program based on their delivery date up to six weeks postpartum. Mothers in the control group will not receive any text messages. Both groups will be asked to complete an survey at enrolment and six-weeks postpartum.

The investigators aim to recruitment 180 participants in total, 90 per group.

Enrollment: 180 estimated patients

Sex: Female

Ages: 18+ years old

Volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• have recently given birth within the hospital within 48 hours
• have daily access to a mobile phone with text message capabilities
• are over 18 years of age
• speak and read English or Swahili.

Exclusion criteria

• newborns die or are expected to die prior to leaving the hospital
• they have no access to mobile phone, either personal or shared
• unwilling to receive text messages
• decline to participate
• are experiencing major postnatal complications expected to impact learning or ability to consent while in the hospital (e.g., postpartum hemorrhage, seizures)
• participated in Phase I of this project.

Trial design

Primary purpose: Supportive Care

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: Single Blind

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180 participants in 2 patient groups

Essential Coaching for Every Mother

Experimental group

Description:

Mothers in the intervention group will receive in-hospital education by a non-study nurse midwife while on the postnatal ward prior to discharge as per standard protocol on the unit. On the third day after birth, mothers will receive daily text messages to 6 weeks postpartum. The messages will be sent automatically each day based on the date of birth of the infant.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Essential Coaching for Every Mother

Standard Care

No Intervention group

Description:

Mothers will receive in-person education provided by a non-study nurse midwife while on the postnatal ward prior to discharge as per current standard protocol on the unit. Mothers in this group will not receive any further text messages from the program.