Protocol for a pilot randomised controlled trial of an educational programme for adults on chronic haemodialysis with fatigue (Fatigue-HD)
Bibliographic record
Abstract
INTRODUCTION: Fatigue is a pervasive symptom of end-stage renal disease (ESRD) that is associated with low quality of life, disability and mortality, and has been identified as a top research priority by patients. We developed a personalised, web-supported educational programme (the Personal Energy Planning (PEP) programme) to teach people with ESRD to use energy management to manage fatigue. Preliminary studies have demonstrated positive effects on fatigue and life participation (ie, the ability to participate in valued day-to-day activities), which justifies the need for a randomised controlled trial (RCT) to better understand the efficacy of the programme. The objectives of the pilot RCT are to estimate RCT eligibility, recruitment and attrition rates, to inform the primary outcome measure and sample size for the RCT and to evaluate treatment fidelity among programme administrators. METHODS AND ANALYSIS: A parallel-arm, 1:1 pilot RCT will be conducted at four in-centre haemodialysis units in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. People on haemodialysis who report moderate or severe fatigue on the Fatigue Severity Scale, and meet other study eligibility criteria, will be invited to participate. Consenting participants will be randomised to undergo the 7-9 week 'PEP' programme or an active control, and followed for 12 weeks after the programme concludes. Information on eligibility, recruitment and attrition rates will be collected, and questionnaires assessing fatigue and life participation will be administered preintervention, midintervention, immediately postintervention and 12 weeks postintervention. Analyses will include calculation of eligibility, recruitment and attrition rates; power considerations for the full-scale RCT and evaluation of treatment fidelity of programme administrators. ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION: Risks associated with this study are minor. Patients may experience emotional discomfort while filling out study questionnaires. They will be advised to skip any questions that make them uncomfortable. Potential benefits of participating include any benefit derived from the study intervention, and contributing to research that may benefit people with kidney disease in the future. Trial results will be disseminated via publication in an academic journal and presentation at academic conferences. The study has been approved by the Conjoint Health Research Ethics Board at the University of Calgary (ID #18-1657).
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.049 | 0.044 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.007 | 0.005 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.011 | 0.005 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.003 | 0.004 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.005 | 0.005 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.005 | 0.005 |
| Open science | 0.005 | 0.003 |
| Research integrity | 0.010 | 0.013 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.142 | 0.022 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".