Text4Father Pilot Feasibility, Acceptability Study

Johns Hopkins University

Status: Completed

Conditions: Mhealth; Mobile Health; Fathers; Nuclear Family

Treatments: Behavioral: Text4Father

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other; NIH

Identifiers

NCT04101565

1R21HD097453-01A1 (U.S. NIH Grant/Contract)

IRB00226367

Details and patient eligibility

About

This study evaluates the feasibility, acceptability, and preliminary efficacy of Text4Father among first-time lower income fathers. Half of the participants will receive Text4Father - a text messaging educational program - from mid-pregnancy through 2 months of postnatal age, while the other half will receive usual care.

Full description

Text4Father, a multi-modal text messaging program, is designed to increase first-time lower income fathers' knowledge, self-efficacy, and behavioral engagement on infant care and parenting. Text4Father consists of 48-weeks of twice weekly texts written at a 5th grade reading level. Texts include resource links and instructions to support behavior change (e.g., videos, infographics), starting mid-pregnancy and continuing through 2 months of postnatal age. Text content was developed using formative research and feedback from the target population, consensus building with experts, and an evidence-based review.

Usual maternity care does not involve expectant fathers in education. Further, while father engagement is widely advocated, few public health and clinical approaches aim to engage expectant fathers during the prenatal period and first months after birth - a critical window of opportunity that has been insufficiently leveraged to promote father engagement when fathers describe being unsure of father role.

Enrollment: 120 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18+ years old

Volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Stated willingness to comply with all study procedures and availability for the duration of the study
• Self-reported expectant father and pregnant partner (expectant mother)
• Aged ≥18 years
• In a romantic relationship and expect to continue to be in this relationship during the study period
• Able to speak English
• Lower socioeconomic status (SES) (e.g., high school/general education or vocational/trade school or less; or qualify for Medicaid/public insurance, WIC, SNAP, food stamps)
• Access to necessary resources for participating in a technology-based intervention (i.e., cell phone) and willing/able to receive/send texts

Exclusion criteria

• Individuals who are not able to provide informed consent.

Trial design

Primary purpose: Prevention

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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120 participants in 2 patient groups

Text4Father

Experimental group

Description:

Receipt of twice-weekly texts that include resource links and instructions to support behavior change (e.g., videos, infographics) and start mid-pregnancy and continuing through 2 months of baby's age.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Text4Father

Usual care

No Intervention group

Description:

Usual care that is consistent with typical maternity care in involving expectant fathers.