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Trial registered on ANZCTR


Registration number
ACTRN12625000961448
Ethics application status
Approved
Date submitted
28/07/2025
Date registered
2/09/2025
Date last updated
2/09/2025
Date data sharing statement initially provided
2/09/2025
Type of registration
Prospectively registered

Titles & IDs
Public title
Implementing a collaborative prescribing, pharmacist-nurse-led adult diabetes clinic within the Robina Health Precinct: A pilot study.
Scientific title
Implementing a collaborative prescribing, pharmacist-nurse-led adult diabetes clinic within the Robina Health Precinct: A pilot study.
Secondary ID [1] 315006 0
Nil Known
Universal Trial Number (UTN)
Trial acronym
Linked study record

Health condition
Health condition(s) or problem(s) studied:
Diabetes 338341 0
Condition category
Condition code
Metabolic and Endocrine 334633 334633 0 0
Diabetes

Intervention/exposure
Study type
Interventional
Description of intervention(s) / exposure
A single-centre, pilot, randomised controlled trial (RCT) comparing a collaborative prescribing pharmacist-nurse-led clinic (intervention) to an endocrinologist-led clinic (usual care). Patients referred to a community based, diabetes multidisciplinary clinic will be randomised to the intervention or control arm.
Intervention arm: participants randomised to the intervention arm will see the pharmacist and clinical nurse (CN) in addition to other members of the mutlidisciplinary team (MDT) as per clinical need. Other members of the MDT may include a dietitian, exercise physiologist, podiatrist, physiotherapist, psychologist, occupational therapist, social worker. Consultations will occur face to face for the baseline consultation. Ongoing follow ups with the patient will occur based on clinical need however, at a minimum, follow up will occur at 3 months. Follow up may be either face to face, phone or videoconference with the anticipated follow up appointment time taking approximately 15 – 30 minutes. The final follow up at 6-months will occur face to face and will take 30 minutes.
The baseline consult will take 40 - 60 minutes with the pharmacist undertaking: (i) medication history (ii) review of relevant pathology, (iii) observations (e.g., blood pressure [BP], blood glucose level [BGL]), (iv) assessment focusing on diabetes (DM) management and health beliefs, (v) medication adherence assessment and medication review/non-pharmacological management strategies. The CN will contribute jointly to the discussion, providing education specific to diabetes management. A collaborative patient care plan will be developed for discussion with the endocrinologist via videoconference after the consultation and will include recommendations such as prescribing new/modifying/ceasing therapy, ordering further tests, and referring to members of the MDT. The endocrinologist will indicate which recommendations they agree with or do not accept. The pharmacist and CN will enact agreed recommendations, with any prescriptions provided by the endocrinologist and forwarded to the patient. Community pharmacies and general practitioners (GPs) will be included in correspondence to ensure continuity of care.
As this is a feasibility study, one of the primary outcomes seeks to measure adherence to the intervention which will be measured by recording session attendance by participants at all scheduled appointments/follow ups.
Intervention code [1] 331601 0
Treatment: Other
Comparator / control treatment
Control arm: participants randomised to usual care will attend the endocrinologist-led DM clinic in addition to other members of the MDT as per clinical need. The clinic appointment with the endocrinologist will take approximately 40 - 60 minutes and incorporates an assessment and plan for optimisation of diabetes control. This baseline consult will occur face to face. Ongoing follow ups with the patient will occur based on clinical need however, at a minimum, follow up will occur at 3 months. Follow up may be either face to face, phone or videoconference with the anticipated follow up appointment time taking approximately 15 – 30 minutes. The final follow up at 6-months will occur face to face and will take 30 minutes.
Control group
Active

Outcomes
Primary outcome [1] 342314 0
Feasibility outcome 1: Recruitment,
Timepoint [1] 342314 0
24 months at trial conclusion.
Primary outcome [2] 342316 0
Feasibility outcome 2: Randomisation.
Timepoint [2] 342316 0
24 months at trial conclusion.
Primary outcome [3] 342317 0
Feasibility outcome 3: Retention.
Timepoint [3] 342317 0
24 months at trial conclusion.
Secondary outcome [1] 450312 0
Primary outcome: Feasibility outcome 4: Acceptability to participants.
Timepoint [1] 450312 0
Patient participants will be interviewed as they exit the study at their 6-month follow up post-baseline assessment.
Secondary outcome [2] 450927 0
Primary Outcome: Feasibility outcome 5: Acceptability to health care staff.
Timepoint [2] 450927 0
Health care staff will be interviewed at the conclusion of the trial at 24 months.
Secondary outcome [3] 450928 0
Primary outcome: Feasibility outcome 6: Treatment fidelity.
Timepoint [3] 450928 0
At baseline, 12-months and 24-months at study conclusion.
Secondary outcome [4] 450929 0
Primary Outcome: Feasibility outcome 7: Safety.
Timepoint [4] 450929 0
Ongoing across the 24 months of the study as/when adverse events reported occur and/or endocrinologist does not accept recommendations made by pharmacist due to concerns around patient safety if their recommendation were to be accepted. One example might be where the pharmacist recommends a medication to reduce blood sugar which may be contraindicated in a patient due to prior adverse reaction or suggests a dose of a medication which may have increased the risk of a hypoglyaemic event..
Secondary outcome [5] 450930 0
Secondary Outcome 1: changes from baseline to 6-month follow up post baseline assessment in intervention and usual care arms in HbA1c.
Timepoint [5] 450930 0
Baseline and 6-months post-baseline.
Secondary outcome [6] 450931 0
Secondary Outcome 2: changes from baseline to 6-month follow up post baseline assessment in intervention and usual care arms in estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) .
Timepoint [6] 450931 0
Baseline and 6 months post-baseline.
Secondary outcome [7] 451390 0
Secondary Outcome 3: changes from baseline to 6-month follow up post baseline assessment in intervention and usual care arms in albumin creatinine ratio (ACR).
Timepoint [7] 451390 0
Baseline and 6 months post-baseline.
Secondary outcome [8] 451391 0
Secondary Outcome 4: changes from baseline to 6-month follow up post baseline assessment in intervention and usual care arms in low density lipoprotein (LDL).
Timepoint [8] 451391 0
Baseline and 6 months post-baseline.
Secondary outcome [9] 451392 0
Secondary Outcome 5: changes from baseline to 6-month follow up post baseline assessment in intervention and usual care arms in absolute cardiovascular risk (%) as per the Australian CVD risk calculator.
Timepoint [9] 451392 0
Baseline and 6 months post-baseline.
Secondary outcome [10] 451393 0
Secondary Outcome 6: changes from baseline to 6-month follow up post baseline assessment in intervention and usual care arms in weight (kg).
Timepoint [10] 451393 0
Baseline and 6 months post-baseline.
Secondary outcome [11] 451394 0
Secondary Outcome 7: changes from baseline to 6-month follow up post baseline assessment in intervention and usual care arms in waist circumference (cm).
Timepoint [11] 451394 0
Baseline and 6 months post-baseline.
Secondary outcome [12] 451708 0
Secondary Outcome 8: changes from baseline to 6-month follow up post baseline assessment in intervention and usual care arms in medication adherence report scale (MARS)
Timepoint [12] 451708 0
Baseline and 6 months post-baseline.
Secondary outcome [13] 451709 0
Secondary Outcome 9: changes from baseline to 6-month follow up post baseline assessment in intervention and usual care arms in Belief In Medicines Questionnaire (BMQ).
Timepoint [13] 451709 0
Baseline and 6 months post-baseline.
Secondary outcome [14] 451710 0
Secondary Outcome 10: changes from baseline to 6-month follow up post baseline assessment in intervention and usual care arms in Diabetes Quality of Life Brief Clinical Intervention questionnaire (DQoL-BCI).
Timepoint [14] 451710 0
Baseline and 6 months post-baseline.
Secondary outcome [15] 451711 0
Secondary Outcome 11: changes from baseline to 6-month follow up post baseline assessment in intervention and usual care arms in Euro-Quality 5-dimension health related quality of life tool.
Timepoint [15] 451711 0
Baseline and 6 months post-baseline.

Eligibility
Key inclusion criteria
Participants aged 18 years and above with an HbA1c>8%.
Minimum age
18 Years
Maximum age
No limit
Sex
Both males and females
Can healthy volunteers participate?
No
Key exclusion criteria
Participants declining the GCHHS RHP DM service or an inability to give informed consent or referred for allied health/diabetes educator input only, previous recruitment to the study, patients with type 1 diabetes using insulin pump therapy, patients from a non-English speaking background unable to read the PICF or complete the required medication adherence and quality of life questionnaires.

Study design
Purpose of the study
Treatment
Allocation to intervention
Randomised controlled trial
Procedure for enrolling a subject and allocating the treatment (allocation concealment procedures)
Sealed opaque envelopes
Methods used to generate the sequence in which subjects will be randomised (sequence generation)
Blocked randomisation will be used to ensure participant numbers are equal in each arm of the study each month, utilising online randomisation software. Two treatment groups will be used (Intervention vs. control) with block sizes of six (i.e. three participants being randomised to each arm per month), and a list length of 108 to indicate that we plan to recruit 108 participants in total (i.e. 54 participants in each group over 18 months; 3x18=54).
Masking / blinding
Open (masking not used)
Who is / are masked / blinded?



Intervention assignment
Parallel
Other design features
Phase
Not Applicable
Type of endpoint/s
Efficacy
Statistical methods / analysis
Quantitative data will be analysed using R with descriptive statistics presented using mean/standard deviation or median/interquartile range [IQR] for continuous data, and frequency/percentages for categorical data. Outcomes for continuous variables will be analysed using appropriate parametric or non-parametric tests to study the effect within each arm from baseline to 6 months (time effect), and to evaluate the group effect (i.e., mean change from baseline in the intervention group vs. mean change from baseline in the usual care group). A p-value of <0.05 will be considered statistically significant and 95% confidence intervals used where appropriate.

When considering sample sizes for pilot studies, 30 – 40 participants per group has been suggested to provide confidence intervals to assist in defining the range of values for a subsequent power analysis. This aligns with a previous study in a pharmacist-led DM review clinic, where 30 participants per arm provided 80% power (a=0.05) for detecting a 1% reduction in HbA1c with 1.2% standard deviation. In our pilot study, the endocrinologist clinic will see 5 - 7 patients per clinic per month with 3 of these patients as new referrals. Over 18 months, this will result in 54 new patients. The intervention arm (collaborative prescribing pharmacist-nurse-led clinic) will also see 3 new patients per week resulting in 54 new patients over the 18-month period. Accounting for a 20% dropout rate, this would still result in over 40 participants in each arm, providing ample numbers for participation.

Qualitative data from semi-structured interviews will be analysed using Braun and Clarke’s 2012 approach to thematic analysis. Thematic analysis has been used throughout the medical and health research fields undertaking qualitative research, to identify themes or patterns across different data sets. We plan to interview 18 – 20 participants and all health care staff involved in the research (endocrinologist, pharmacist, nurse and research assistant). NVivo software will be used to import all transcripts and coding for the purposes of refining and managing the data from which themes and subthemes will be drawn and analysed, until saturation has occurred based on consensus from the research team.

All data collected will be used whether participants remain or withdraw from the study, based on an intention-to-treat analysis. Any patient that requests to withdraw from the study will be asked if their data can still be collected to the six month follow up point. This will be requested in the PICF.

Recruitment
Recruitment status
Not yet recruiting
Date of first participant enrolment
Anticipated
Actual
Date of last participant enrolment
Anticipated
Actual
Date of last data collection
Anticipated
Actual
Sample size
Target
Accrual to date
Final
Recruitment in Australia
Recruitment state(s)
QLD
Recruitment hospital [1] 28245 0
Gold Coast University Hospital - Southport
Recruitment postcode(s) [1] 44457 0
4215 - Southport

Funding & Sponsors
Funding source category [1] 319571 0
Hospital
Name [1] 319571 0
Gold Coast Hospital and Health Service
Country [1] 319571 0
Australia
Primary sponsor type
Hospital
Name
Gold Coast Hospital and Health Service
Address
Country
Australia
Secondary sponsor category [1] 322067 0
None
Name [1] 322067 0
Address [1] 322067 0
Country [1] 322067 0

Ethics approval
Ethics application status
Approved
Ethics committee name [1] 318134 0
Gold Coast Hospital and Health Service Human Research Ethics Committee
Ethics committee address [1] 318134 0
Ethics committee country [1] 318134 0
Australia
Date submitted for ethics approval [1] 318134 0
16/07/2025
Approval date [1] 318134 0
01/09/2025
Ethics approval number [1] 318134 0

Summary
Brief summary
Trial website
Trial related presentations / publications
Public notes

Contacts
Principal investigator
Name 143222 0
Dr Matthew Percival
Address 143222 0
Gold Coast Hospital and Health Service, Robina Health Precinct, 2 Campus Crescent, Robina, Queensland, 4226
Country 143222 0
Australia
Phone 143222 0
+61 409642636
Fax 143222 0
Email 143222 0
Contact person for public queries
Name 143223 0
Matthew Percival
Address 143223 0
Gold Coast Hospital and Health Service, Robina Health Precinct, 2 Campus Crescent, Robina, Queensland, 4226
Country 143223 0
Australia
Phone 143223 0
+61 409642636
Fax 143223 0
Email 143223 0
Contact person for scientific queries
Name 143224 0
Matthew Percival
Address 143224 0
Gold Coast Hospital and Health Service, Robina Health Precinct, 2 Campus Crescent, Robina, Queensland, 4226
Country 143224 0
Australia
Phone 143224 0
+61 409642636
Fax 143224 0
Email 143224 0

Data sharing statement
Will the study consider sharing individual participant data?
No


What supporting documents are/will be available?

No Supporting Document Provided


Results publications and other study-related documents

Documents added manually
No documents have been uploaded by study researchers.

Documents added automatically
No additional documents have been identified.