Testing the Effectiveness of Night Shift, a Theory-based Customized Video Game

University of Pittsburgh

Status: Completed

Conditions: Trauma Injury; Physician's Role

Treatments: Behavioral: Night Shift; Behavioral: Usual education

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other; NIH

Identifiers

NCT06063434

R01AG076499 (U.S. NIH Grant/Contract)

STUDY23070156

Details and patient eligibility

About

The goal of this clinical trial is to test the effect of a video game on the implementation of clinical practice guidelines in trauma triage. The main question it attempts to answer is whether exposure to the game improves compliance with guidelines by emergency medicine physicians working at non-trauma centers in the US. Participants randomized to the intervention condition will be asked to play a customized, theory-based video game for 2 hours immediately after enrollment, and then return to the game for 20 minutes every three months for the next 9 months. Participants in the control condition will receive usual care.

Full description

Transfer of severely injured patients to trauma centers, either directly from the field or after evaluation at non-trauma centers, reduces preventable morbidity and mortality. Failure to transfer these patients appropriately (i.e., under-triage) remains common, and occurs in part because physicians at non-trauma centers make diagnostic errors when evaluating the severity of patients' injuries. The study team developed Night Shift, a theory-based adventure video game, to recalibrate physician heuristics (intuitive judgments) in trauma triage and established its efficacy in the laboratory. The investigators plan a Type 1 hybrid effectiveness-implementation trial to determine whether the game changes physician triage decisions in real-life, and hypothesize that it will reduce the proportion of patients under-triaged.

Enrollment: 800 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 25 to 70 years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Board certified physicians who work exclusively in the emergency departments (EDs) of non-trauma centers in the US AND triage adult trauma patients

Exclusion criteria

• non-physician healthcare professionals who work in EDs
• physicians who work at trauma and non-trauma centers
• physicians who work outside the continental US

Trial design

Primary purpose: Health Services Research

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: Single Blind

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800 participants in 2 patient groups

Night Shift

Experimental group

Description:

Night Shift 2024 is a customized, theory-based adventure video game in which the player takes on the character of Andy Jordan, a young emergency medicine physician who moves home after the disappearance of his grandfather and takes a job at a local community hospital. The investigators will ask participants to play Night Shift for 2 hours upon enrollment (or within 2 weeks), and then come back to the game quarterly to play it again for 20 minute booster sessions. They will unlock additional game content each quarter to make the experience more enjoyable.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Night Shift

Usual education

Active Comparator group

Description:

Participants will receive their usual continuing medical education, but nothing additional.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Usual education