This observational study will involve a non-randomised, mixed-methods, feasibility study, setting out to test and refine a digital social intervention for people with troublesome asthma in primary care. The feasibility study will consist of a number of steps, including a questionnaire survey to identify and recruit eligible patients, intervention delivery, collection of follow-up outcomes, and exit one-to-one interviews with a sample of patients and primary care clinicians. Provided the feasibility study is successful, there are plans to undertake a full randomised controlled trial.
The precise content of the survey is currently being co-developed with stakeholders. However, the research team envisages including questions about participants' demographic and socioeconomic data, asthma symptoms, control and self-management, quality of life, mental wellbeing, health literacy, and interest in digital social interventions. Completion of the survey should take around 15 minutes.
Eligible patients identified through the survey will be invited to receive the intervention (see 'Groups and Interventions' section below). The exact content of the intervention is still being co-developed with patients and clinicians. Clinicians delivering the intervention will be thoroughly trained (through an online workshop/session) on the practicalities of signing patients up to an OHC, including on seeking and recording consent and collecting baseline data. The precise content of training is still being developed in collaboration with various stakeholders.
A number of outcomes, both self-reported and non-self-reported by patients, will be collected (see 'Outcome measures' section below). The self-reported outcome variables will be collected, via an online form designed on RedCap software, at baseline and at six months following the intervention. For the baseline collection, clinicians will add patients' responses to the online form at the time of delivering the intervention. For the follow-up collection, participants will receive a link to the online form, via a text message from the practice with which participants are registered, for self-submission (form completion should take 10-15 minutes).
A sample of patients and clinicians will be invited to participate in a one-to-one, semi-structured interview. Clinicians will be interviewed shortly after delivering the intervention to all recruited patients, whereas patients will be interviewed at the end of the feasibility study (i.e. after the completion of the follow-up period). An interview topic guide composed of open-ended questions and prompts will be used to elicit experiences of delivering/receiving the intervention. Based on individual participants' preferences, interviews will take place either in person (within private meeting or consultation spaces in the general practices) or virtually (via Zoom platform). Interviews should last approximately 30-90 minutes, depending on how much each participant has to share, and will be audio recorded through digital recorders or by using the Cloud function in Zoom. Basic demographic data will be collected at the time of the interview.
