Accepted for/Published in: JMIR Human Factors
Date Submitted: Jul 24, 2024
Date Accepted: Dec 20, 2024
Warning: This is an author submission that is not peer-reviewed or edited. Preprints - unless they show as "accepted" - should not be relied on to guide clinical practice or health-related behavior and should not be reported in news media as established information.
Use of wearable transdermal alcohol sensors for monitoring alcohol consumption post-detox with CM: A pilot randomised feasibility trial
ABSTRACT
Background:
Wearable transdermal alcohol sensor devices generate continuous data on alcohol consumption through the indiscernible sweat vapours on the skin. This continuous alcohol monitoring capability could enable a new method for alcohol services to monitor service users at various stages of their alcohol treatment.
Objective:
We aim to assess the feasibility of using a transdermal alcohol sensor as part of alcohol treatment with alcohol service users using the device with or without contingency management.
Methods:
A feasibility study was conducted of a convenience sample of 29 current service users from three South London alcohol services. Participants were randomized into either a control (treatment as usual) or contingency management (CM) group (treatment as usual + CM). We assessed the feasibility of enrolment, participants, device tampering and return, device wearability and the accuracy of data capture. This data was reported descriptively where appropriate, groups were compared, alcohol self-report data was compared to the TAC to assess accuracy.
Results:
A total of 34 were approached and 32 were enrolled and randomised (17=control,15=CM) over five months. Three participants withdrew (2=control, 1=CM). There was a total of 203 meetings arranged (29 participants x 7 meetings) and 185 were attended (91.1%). Only one participant (1/29, 3.4%) admitted to turning the TAS off to avoid monitoring. There were some issues with the TAS not functioning properly and not being able to be cleaned. Removals were recorded but the definition of TAS removal may need to be improved for future trials. There was a high TAS return rate (28/29 participants returned, 96.6%). Secondary outcomes suggest that the BACtrack Skyn remains an accurate tool to monitor alcohol consumption compared to their self-report data and that it is acceptable to wearers over two weeks with many participants (27/28, 96.4%) answering that they would wear it again and for longer but that the CM procedure could be made clearer.
Conclusions:
The delivery of CM via a TAS was feasible in this study but recommendations for a future larger trial include that the study design should be changed to provide an operationalised method of checking rather than manual human checking of TAS data meeting CM criteria. This would reduce researcher burden and researcher and participant time. Current recruitment and research meeting design seem suitable for a future larger trial. Clinical Trial: Trial registration: ISRCTN ISRCTN46845361
Citation
