Clinical Trial: Digital Human-Based Brief Interventions for Harmful Alcohol Use: The PAHOLA Project

Study Status: NOT_YET_RECRUITING
Recruit Status: NOT_YET_RECRUITING
Study Type: INTERVENTIONAL

Official Title: Digital Human-Based Brief Interventions for Harmful Alcohol Use: The PAHOLA Project

Brief Summary:

Alcohol use disorders are among the most prevalent mental disorders in Canada; however, due to numerous barriers, including fear of treatment, privacy concerns, stigma, time conflicts, and lack of availability of treatment, less than 10% of people with alcohol dependence receive treatment.
Accordingly, there is a need to expand treatment coverage for alcohol use disorders, especially for populations which face barriers to receiving treatment.

The objective of this proposed project is to develop a digital health worker, named PAHOLA, which can effectively deliver interventions to people who would not otherwise receive such treatment.
To achieve this objective, the following research aims will be addressed:

To develop a digital human-based intervention that can initiate change processes and reduce alcohol use by applying the principles of motivational interviewing (MI) and cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) in a credible manner.
To assess the impact of the virtual care provided by PAHOLA on health outcomes using a randomized controlled study design (RCT) to assess potential effect sizes for a larger future RCT.

If successful, the PAHOLA project has the potential to transform our ability to prevent alcohol-attributable harms in Canada by promoting health, health equity, and well-being, especially among those people who do not normally receive treatment for harmful alcohol use.