Randomized pilot trial of cell phone support to improve medication adherence among adolescents and young adults with chronic health conditions

Adolescents and young adults (AYA) living with chronic medical conditions often struggle to develop medication adherence skills. This pilot trial evaluated the impact of a mobile health coaching intervention, Cell Phone Support (CPS), on medication adherence.

Interventions in this randomized trial were CPS delivered by phone calls (CPS-C), CPS delivered by text messages (CPS-T), or automated text message reminders (ATR). Participants were AYA with different chronic medical conditions (i.e., sickle cell disease, solid organ transplant, type 2 diabetes), aged 15–20 years (N = 34). We examined the feasibility, acceptability, and preliminary efficacy of each intervention.

We examined the feasibility, acceptability, and preliminary efficacy of both CPS interventions. CPS was feasible and acceptable. There was evidence that participants found CPS to be more useful than ATR. In this pilot trial, participants receiving CPS reported relatively stronger increases in adherence, compared to those assigned to ATR. CPS-C slightly outperformed CPS-T.

Providing coaching to AYA struggling with illness self-management via their cell phones may promote their acquisition of medication adherence skills. Although larger studies are needed to confirm the results of this pilot study, phone calls and text messages are both promising modalities for delivering human cell phone support.

This trial was registered prospectively at ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT04241627) on 1/27/2020.