Weight Management Counseling in Medical Schools (MSWEIGHT)

University of Massachusetts, Worcester

Status: Completed

Conditions: Obesity

Treatments: Behavioral: Multi-Modal Education (MME); Behavioral: Traditional Education (TE)

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other; NIH

Identifiers

NCT02725905

1R01CA194787-01A1 (U.S. NIH Grant/Contract)

6730

Details and patient eligibility

About

Eight U.S. medical schools will be participating in the study: Weight Management Counseling in Medical Schools, also known as MSWEIGHT. This is a five-year randomized controlled trial (RCT) designed to compare the efficacy of two approaches to learning weight management counseling: 1)traditional education (TE) and; 2) multi-modal educational intervention (MME).

The study aims are to refine and compare the efficacy of MME to TE on observed student weight management counseling skills measured through the primary outcome, the Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE).

Full description

Eight U.S. medical schools are matched and then randomized to one of two educational interventions, MME or TE.

Schools randomized to TE represent "usual care" and will continue the current curriculum. The MME arm will build upon the traditional usual curriculum at the medical school. The MME is a multi-modal educational intervention of a series of interactive learning components focused on integrated weight management counseling. This MME intervention for weight management counseling uses the 5As model based on the updated American Heart Association (AHA) /American College of Cardiology (ACC) /The Obesity Society (TOS) and updated NHLBI guidelines.

Enrollment: 3,199 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18+ years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion and exclusion criteria

Inclusion Criteria:

The medical school has:

• Interest in WMC medical education reform.
• Curricula resources (e.g. academic computing) to facilitate web-course training and a system to maintain student contact.
• The willingness and ability to incorporate all components of MSWEIGHT into the medical school curriculum, require or strongly encourage students to participate, and award credit for completion.
• The willingness and ability to offer the WMC OSCE for third year medical students upon completion of the Family or Internal Medicine clerkship rotation.

Exclusion Criteria: The medical school does not have:

• The ability to incorporate all components of MSWEIGHT into the medical school curriculum.
• The ability to offer the WMC OSCE for third year medical students upon completion of the Family or Internal Medicine clerkship rotation.

Trial design

Primary purpose: Prevention

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: Single Blind

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3,199 participants in 2 patient groups

Multi-Modal Education (MME)

Experimental group

Description:

1) The MME is a three year multi-modal educational intervention including a series of interactive learning components and interventions focused on integrated weight management counseling. Prior to its launch, each component of the curriculum will be refined using a school participatory approach to help ensure feasibility and acceptability.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Multi-Modal Education (MME)

Traditional Education (TE)

Active Comparator group

Description:

2) The TE arm of the study includes the school's current curriculum which may include topics related to the treatment of weight management and obesity.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Traditional Education (TE)