Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2024 Dec;30(1):2407594.
doi: 10.1080/13814788.2024.2407594. Epub 2024 Sep 27.

Development of the face-to-face component and recruitment strategy of a primary care digital social intervention for patients with asthma: Qualitative focus groups and interviews with stakeholders

Georgios Dimitrios Karampatakis  1   2 , Samuel Kimber  3 , Helen E Wood  1   2 , Chris J Griffiths  1   2 , Stephanie J C Taylor  1   2 , Xiancheng Li  4 , Bill Day  1   2 , Jonathan Mant  5 , Clare Relton  1   2 , Jane S Watson  6 , Viv Marsh  7 , Neil S Coulson  7 , Anna De Simoni  1   2
Affiliations

Development of the face-to-face component and recruitment strategy of a primary care digital social intervention for patients with asthma: Qualitative focus groups and interviews with stakeholders

Georgios Dimitrios Karampatakis et al. Eur J Gen Pract. 2024 Dec.

Abstract

Background: 5.4 million people in the UK have asthma, with one third experiencing suboptimal control, leading to co-morbidities and increased healthcare use. A quarter of people with long-term conditions informally access peer support through online health communities (OHCs). However, integrating online peer support into primary care services to facilitate self-management is a new concept.

Objectives: To develop together with stakeholders the content, delivery, and recruitment strategy of a digital social intervention to promote use of online peer support amongst asthma patients in primary care.

Methods: Data was collected by qualitative, audio-recorded, one-to-one interviews with clinicians, and focus groups with patients with asthma from East London general practices. The topic guide was informed by patient and public involvement work. Data collected was iterative (i.e. new ideas were added to subsequent interviews and focus groups). Verbatim transcripts were uploaded to NVivo12 and thematically analysed.

Results: Twenty patients from several ethnicities participated across five focus groups, and three general practitioners and three practice nurses were interviewed. The study's outputs included: the intervention's face-to-face content; content of clinician training; patient-facing leaflets/material; and a survey to recruit eligible patients. An intervention consisting of a structured consultation with a primary care clinician followed by OHC engagement, was developed based on three generated themes: 'introducing OHCs', describing how clinicians should introduce OHCs; 'OHC engagement', describing factors influencing OHC engagement; and 'clinician training'.

Conclusion: Findings will assist clinicians in consultations about supporting self-management of patients through OHCs. Future research should evaluate feasibility, effectiveness, and cost-effectiveness of such support.

Keywords: Primary health care; asthma; online health community; peer support; qualitative research.

Plain language summary

Promoting online peer support in primary care consultations is a novel concept.The study developed the content of a digital social intervention for patients with asthma.The findings of the current study will inform primary care clinicians’ consultations on digital social interventions and will be tested in a trial.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Creaser et al.’s model, as adapted for the needs of our study, employed to develop a digital social intervention for patients with asthma in primary care.
Figure 2.
Figure 2.
Themes and Sub–themes generated from patients’ and clinicians’ views about content and delivery of a digital social intervention in primary care.
Figure 3.
Figure 3.
Summary of a digital social intervention in primary care for patients with asthma, as developed together with patients and clinicians.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

References

    1. National Institute for Health and Care Excellence . What is the prevalence of asthma? 2023 [cited 2023 September 28]. Available from: https://cks.nice.org.uk/topics/asthma/background-information/prevalence/.
    1. Noble M, Burden A, Stirling S, et al. . Predicting asthma-related crisis events using routine electronic healthcare data: a quantitative database analysis study. Br J Gen Pract. 2021;71(713):e948–e57. doi: 10.3399/BJGP.2020.1042. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Cooper CL, Parry GD, Saul C, et al. . Anxiety and panic fear in adults with asthma: prevalence in primary care. BMC Fam Pract. 2007;8(1):62. doi: 10.1186/1471-2296-8-62. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Cassell A, Edwards D, Harshfield A, et al. . The epidemiology of multimorbidity in primary care: a retrospective cohort study. Br J Gen Pract. 2018;68(669):e245–e251. doi: 10.3399/bjgp18X695465. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Pinnock H, Epiphaniou E, Pearce G, et al. . Implementing supported self-management for asthma: a systematic review and suggested hierarchy of evidence of implementation studies. BMC Med. 2015;13(1):127. doi: 10.1186/s12916-015-0361-0. - DOI - PMC - PubMed