Prescribing DecisionsNCT06605807
Optimizing Prescribing Decisions for Hospitalized Older Adults With Chronic Conditions
A study testing Clinical Decision Framework for Managing older adults' chronic conditions during hospitalization. in people with Prescribing Decisions and Diabetes, run by University of Pittsburgh at 1 site in United States.
Trial summary
The goal of this pilot clinical trial is to learn if providing a clinical decision framework for managing older adults chronic conditions during hospitalization to inpatient clinicians improves clinicians' ability to individualize chronic condition prescribing decisions for hospitalized older adults (65 and older). Read more about this study
- Who is it for?
- Ages 18 years and older
- Conditions the study is for
- Prescribing Decisions, Diabetes, Multimorbidity
- What is being tested?
- Clinical Decision Framework for Managing older adults' chronic conditions during hospitalization.
- Could I receive a placebo?
- No, everyone receives an active treatment
- How many people
- 64 participants
- Where
- 1 siteUnited States
- Study dates
- 13 Nov 2025to 30 Jan 2027
- Phase
- Interventional
- Are there results?
- Not yet: the study is under way
Key requirements
Who can take part, as listed by the sponsor. Only the study team can confirm whether you are eligible, so take this list to your doctor.
- Ages 18 years and older
- All sexes
- No healthy volunteers
- Adult, Older adult
Who may be able to join
- Attending clinicians who practice on the general medicine or hospital medicine service at UPMC Presbyterian, UPMC Montefiore, UPMC Shadyside, UPMC Mercy, or UPMC Magee-Women's Hospital campuses.
- Practicing on the general medicine or hospital medicine service. This population may include physicians with training in general internal medicine, hospital medicine, family practice, internal medicine subspecialities, as well as advance practice clinicians.
- Adult aged 65 years or older who are hospitalized under the care of a participating clinician and discharged home.
- Eligible patients must recieve at least one cardiometabolic medication change at hospital discharge (can include new medication starts, stops, or dose changes). Cardiometabolic medications include any class of antihypertensive, lipid lowering, anti-platelet, or glucose lowering medications regardless of indication for use.
Who cannot join
- Anticipating leaving current clinical position within next 3 months
- Less than 4 weeks of inpatient attending service scheduled within 3 months of recruitment
- Patient Participants:
- Incapacity for informed consent / unable to answer survey questions due to cognitive impairment
- Enrolled in hospice care
Trial locations and contacts
1 site in 1 country.
United States1 site
University of Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, 15213
About this study
Official title: Optimizing Prescribing Decisions for Hospitalized Older Adults With Chronic Conditions: Aim 3
The goal of this pilot clinical trial is to learn if providing a clinical decision framework for managing older adults chronic conditions during hospitalization to inpatient clinicians improves clinicians' ability to individualize chronic condition prescribing decisions for hospitalized older adults (65 and older). The main questions it aims to answer are:
- Will the clinical decision framework lead to clinicians having greater confidence to individualize discharge prescribing?
- Will clinicians using the framework discharge make fewer changes to hospitalized older adults with home diabetes and hypertension medications than they did prior to receiving the framework?
- Will older adult patients of participating clinicians will report fewer gaps in understanding of medication changes after the clinician is exposed to the framework?
Read more
Researchers will compare participating clinician survey responses and prescribing records from before and after an educational session presenting the clinical decision framework.
Participants will be asked to
- Attend a one-time educational session on the clinical decision framework
- Complete 2 electronic surveys, one before and one following the educational session.
- Agree for researchers to contact their patients, in order for patients to complete a one-time phone survey about changes made to home medications during hospitalization and quality of communication from the hospital team.
- Conditions
- Prescribing Decisions, Diabetes, Multimorbidity, Hypertension, Geriatrics
- Being tested
- Clinical Decision Framework for Managing older adults' chronic conditions during hospitalization.
- Keywords
- prescribing, hypertension, diabetes, geriatrics, polypharmacy, multimorbidity, hospital medicine
- Medical subject headings
- Diabetes Mellitus, Hypertension
What participants receive
What participants receive. In a randomised study each person is assigned to one group by chance.
Clinical Decision Framework for Managing older adults' chronic conditions during hospitalization.Other
All clinicians will attend an educational session where they will be provided a clinical decision framework for management of chronic conditions in hospitalized older adults, reviewing guiding principles for managing chronic disease in the hospital, and working through case-based hypothetical examples.
| Study group | Role | What they receive |
|---|---|---|
| Clinician Participants | Experimental | All clinician participants will undergo the same intervention, an educational session providing a clinical decision framework for managing older adults' chronic conditions during hospitalization. Receives: Other: Clinical Decision Framework for Managing older adults' chronic conditions during hospitalization. |
What is being measured
The primary outcome is the main question the study is designed to answer.
Clinician - Change in Prescribing Self-Efficacy
For each clinician participant the investigators will ask their self-efficacy to individualize blood pressure and diabetes treatment decisions for hospitalized older adults. Measured through ten 7-point Likert scale questions measured [Strongly Disagree - Strongly Agree]. Scores will be summed and range from 10 (all Strongly Disagree) to 70 (all Strongly Agree).
Measured: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Secondary outcomes (12)
Clinician - Change in Attitudes
The investigators will ask clinicians 8 questions about their attitudes towards individualizing antihypertensive and diabetes treatment decisions on a 7-point Likert scale. Individualizing antihypertensive and diabetes treatment decisions for hospitalized older adults is:
Necessary - Unnecessary Beneficial - Harmful High-priority - Low-priority Worthless - Useful.
Scores will be summed and range from 8 to 56.
Measured: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Clinician - Discharge Prescribing
For each clinician participant, the investigators will review the electronic health record for all hospitalized patients aged 65 years and older who were discharged alive under the clinician participant's care in the 2 months before and 3 months after the intervention to identify all antihypertensive and diabetes medication changes made during hospitalization. The investigators will compare the proportion of patients discharged with cardiometabolic medication changes in the 2 months prior to the intervention to the 3 months after the intervention. The investigators will examine proportion of patients receiving medication intensifications and the proportion receiving any medication change.
Measured: Pre-intervention and post-intervention (2 months before and 3 months after the intervention)
Patient - Change in Medication Discrepencies
The investigators will ask each enrolled patient how they are taking each of their cardiometabolic medications and compare their current reported medication use to the hospital discharge summary. The investigators will compare the proportion of patient participants reported a medication discrepancy (taking medication differently than hospital discharge summary) in the pre-intervention period to the post-intervention period.
Measured: Single time survey within a week of discharge from clinician participants care.
Clinician - Acceptability of Clinical Decision Framework
The investigators will ask clinicians if they used the clinical decision framework and 7 questions on a 7 point Likert scale (strongly disagree to strongly agree) regarding the framework's clarity, length, and whether it was useful. The investigators will ask what they liked about the framework and what would they change. The investigators will ask about facilitators and barriers to using the framework and whether they plan to keep using it. Scores will be summed and range from 7 to 49.
Measured: 3 months post-intervention
Clinician - Change in Intentions
The investigators will ask each enrolled clinician two questions to assess choice predisposition (leaning) towards individualizing blood pressure and diabetes medications prescribing decisions during hospitalization using two 7-point Likert Scales (Strongly Disagree to Strongly Agree). Scores will be summed and range from 2 (all Strongly Disagree) to 14 (all Strongly Agree).
Measured: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Clinician - Change in Perceived Norms
The investigators will ask each enrolled clinician six questions on their perceptions on norms on individualizing blood pressure and diabetes treatment decisions for hospitalized older adults. Measured through 7-point Likert scale questions measured [Strongly Disagree - Strongly Agree]. Scores will be summed and range from 6 (all Strongly Disagree) to 42 (all Strongly Agree).
Measured: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Clinician - Awareness of Evidence Base
The investigators will ask each enrolled clinician to respond to four questions regarding their familiarity with the evidence base for the treatment of blood pressure and diabetes while a patient is hospitalized. These will be framed as four 7-point Likert Scales (Strongly Disagree to Strongly Agree). Scores will be summed and range from 4 (all Strongly Disagree) to 28 (all Strongly Agree).
Measured: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Patient - Change in Overall Hospital Experience
The investigators will ask each enrolled patient to rate their overall hospital experience from 0 to 10. Where 0 is I had a very poor experience and 10 is I had a very good experience. Scores will be summed from 0 to 10. The investigators will compare average scores of patients in the pre-intervention period to the post-intervention period
Measured: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Patient - Change in Experience in the Hospital
The investigators will ask each enrolled patient a 4 question survey on communication during their hospital stay. Possible answers include never (1), sometimes (2), usually (3), and always (4). Scores will be summed from 4 to 16. The investigators will compare mean scores of patients in the pre-intervention period to the post-intervention period.
Measured: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Patient - Change in Experience Leaving the Hospital
The investigators will ask each enrolled patient a 3 question survey on communication when they left the hospital. Possible answers include not at all (1), partly (2), quite a bit (3), completely (4), and not applicable (0). Scores will be summed from 0 to 12. The investigators will compare mean scores of patients in the pre-intervention period to the post-intervention period.
Measured: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Patient - Change in Understanding of Medication Changes
The investigators will ask each enrolled patient their understanding of the reason for each cardiometabolic medication change made at hospital discharge and compare their understanding to the hospital discharge summary rationale to identify concordant versus discordant understanding. The investigators will compare the proportion of patients with discordant understanding of cardiometabolic medication changes in the pre-intervention period to the post-intervention period.
Measured: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Patient - Change in Comprehension of Disease Monitoring
The investigators will ask each patient participant enrolled if the hospital discussed their blood pressure and/or provided guidance on disease monitoring (e.g. blood pressure or blood glucose) after discharge. The investigators will compare the proportion of patients reporting guidance on disease monitoring from the pre-intervention to post-intervention period.
Measured: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Timeline
From the start of the study to its completion; the mark is today. Estimated dates are the sponsor’s plan.
- First posted20 Sep 2024
- Study start13 Nov 2025
- Primary completion17 Aug 2026
- Study completion30 Jan 2027 (estimated)
Resources
- Official record on ClinicalTrials.govThe registry entry this page is built from, with its full change history.
- Other trials for Prescribing DecisionsStudies of the same condition, open and under way.
- More trials run by University of PittsburghThe sponsor's other registered studies.
- What the trial phases meanHow a treatment moves from first tests in people to approval.
More details
For doctors and researchers: how the study is designed, who runs it, and its registry IDs.
Study design
- Study type
- Interventional
- Phase
- Phase N/A
- Primary purpose
- Health services research
- Allocation
- Not applicable
- Intervention model
- Single group
- Masking
- None (open label)
- Enrolment
- 64 participants (actual)
Sponsor and investigators
- Lead sponsor
- University of Pittsburgh
- Sponsor type
- University, hospital or other
- Collaborators
- National Institute on Aging (NIA)
- Responsible party
- Principal investigator, Timothy Anderson, University of Pittsburgh
- Investigators
- Timothy S Anderson, MD, MAS, Principal investigator, University of Pittsburgh
IDs, dates and publications
- ClinicalTrials.gov ID
- NCT06605807
- Sponsor's protocol ID
- STUDY24070027
- Other IDs
- K76AG074878
- Status last verified
- Aug 2026
- First submitted
- 13 Sep 2024
- Last updated
- 4 Nov 2026
- Results posted
- No
- Data monitoring committee
- No
- FDA-regulated drug
- No
- FDA-regulated device
- No
- Individual data sharing
- No
Study at a glance
From the registry record, last updated by the sponsor on 4 Nov 2026. Recruitment status is as the sponsor reported it: confirm with the study team.
- Official title
- Optimizing Prescribing Decisions for Hospitalized Older Adults With Chronic Conditions: Aim 3
- ClinicalTrials.gov ID
- NCT06605807
- Acronym / sponsor ID
- STUDY24070027
- Conditions
- Prescribing Decisions, Diabetes, Multimorbidity, Hypertension, Geriatrics
- Keywords
- prescribing, hypertension, diabetes, geriatrics, polypharmacy, multimorbidity, hospital medicine
- Study type
- Interventional
- Recruitment status
- Active, not recruiting
- Enrolment
- 64 participants (actual)
- Lead sponsor
- University of PittsburghUniversity, hospital or other
- Collaborators
- National Institute on Aging (NIA)
- Study start
- 13 Nov 2025 (actual)
- Primary completion
- 17 Aug 2026 (actual)
- Study completion
- 30 Jan 2027 (estimated)
- First posted
- 20 Sep 2024 (actual)
- Results
- Not posted in the source record
Clinical summary
The research question as the sponsor registered it. This describes what the study plans to test, not what it found.
The goal of this pilot clinical trial is to learn if providing a clinical decision framework for managing older adults chronic conditions during hospitalization to inpatient clinicians improves clinicians' ability to individualize chronic condition prescribing decisions for hospitalized older adults (65 and older). The main questions it aims to answer are:
- Will the clinical decision framework lead to clinicians having greater confidence to individualize discharge prescribing?
- Will clinicians using the framework discharge make fewer changes to hospitalized older adults with home diabetes and hypertension medications than they did prior to receiving the framework?
- Will older adult patients of participating clinicians will report fewer gaps in understanding of medication changes after the clinician is exposed to the framework?
Researchers will compare participating clinician survey responses and prescribing records from before and after an educational session presenting the clinical decision framework.
Participants will be asked to
- Attend a one-time educational session on the clinical decision framework
- Complete 2 electronic surveys, one before and one following the educational session.
- Agree for researchers to contact their patients, in order for patients to complete a one-time phone survey about changes made to home medications during hospitalization and quality of communication from the hospital team.
Study design
- Primary purpose
- Health services research
- Allocation
- Not applicable
- Intervention model
- Single group
- Masking
- None (open label)
- Number of arms
- 1
| Arm | Type | Receives |
|---|---|---|
| Clinician Participants | Experimental | Other: Clinical Decision Framework for Managing older adults' chronic conditions during hospitalization.All clinician participants will undergo the same intervention, an educational session providing a clinical decision framework for managing older adults' chronic conditions during hospitalization. |
Who may qualify
- Ages
- 18 years and older
- Sex
- All
- Healthy volunteers
- Not accepted
- Age groups
- Adult, Older adult
Key inclusion criteria (4 listed)
- Attending clinicians who practice on the general medicine or hospital medicine service at UPMC Presbyterian, UPMC Montefiore, UPMC Shadyside, UPMC Mercy, or UPMC Magee-Women's Hospital campuses.
- Practicing on the general medicine or hospital medicine service. This population may include physicians with training in general internal medicine, hospital medicine, family practice, internal medicine subspecialities, as well as advance practice clinicians.
- Adult aged 65 years or older who are hospitalized under the care of a participating clinician and discharged home.
- Eligible patients must recieve at least one cardiometabolic medication change at hospital discharge (can include new medication starts, stops, or dose changes). Cardiometabolic medications include any class of antihypertensive, lipid lowering, anti-platelet, or glucose lowering medications regardless of indication for use.
Key exclusion criteria (5 listed)
- Anticipating leaving current clinical position within next 3 months
- Less than 4 weeks of inpatient attending service scheduled within 3 months of recruitment
- Incapacity for informed consent / unable to answer survey questions due to cognitive impairment
- Enrolled in hospice care
Eligibility is decided by the study team after screening; this overview does not establish that a patient qualifies. Full inclusion and exclusion criteria.
Interventions
| Intervention | Type | Arms |
|---|---|---|
| Clinical Decision Framework for Managing older adults' chronic conditions during hospitalization.All clinicians will attend an educational session where they will be provided a clinical decision framework for management of chronic conditions in hospitalized older adults, reviewing guiding principles for managing chronic disease in the hospital, and working through case-based hypothetical examples. | Other | Clinician Participants |
Primary outcome
Clinician - Change in Prescribing Self-Efficacy
Time frame: Baseline and three months post-intervention
For each clinician participant the investigators will ask their self-efficacy to individualize blood pressure and diabetes treatment decisions for hospitalized older adults. Measured through ten 7-point Likert scale questions measured [Strongly Disagree - Strongly Agree]. Scores will be summed and range from 10 (all Strongly Disagree) to 70 (all Strongly Agree).
12 secondary outcomes
Clinician - Change in Attitudes
Time frame: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Clinician - Discharge Prescribing
Time frame: Pre-intervention and post-intervention (2 months before and 3 months after the intervention)
Patient - Change in Medication Discrepencies
Time frame: Single time survey within a week of discharge from clinician participants care.
Clinician - Acceptability of Clinical Decision Framework
Time frame: 3 months post-intervention
Clinician - Change in Intentions
Time frame: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Clinician - Change in Perceived Norms
Time frame: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Clinician - Awareness of Evidence Base
Time frame: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Patient - Change in Overall Hospital Experience
Time frame: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Patient - Change in Experience in the Hospital
Time frame: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Patient - Change in Experience Leaving the Hospital
Time frame: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Patient - Change in Understanding of Medication Changes
Time frame: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Patient - Change in Comprehension of Disease Monitoring
Time frame: Baseline and three months post-intervention
Results and safety
This study is still under way. Results are not available in the source record yet.
Research links
- Official record on ClinicalTrials.govLast updated by the sponsor 4 Nov 2026.
- Individual participant dataSharing planned: No
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Referral and contact
AzTrials does not enrol participants or take referrals. Contact the study team or a site listed below; they decide who can take part. This study is not recruiting at the moment.
Timothy S Anderson, MD, MAS principal investigator
University of Pittsburgh
1 site in 1 country: see every site and its status.
Questions about this trial
What is this clinical trial studying?
A study testing Clinical Decision Framework for Managing older adults' chronic conditions during hospitalization. in people with Prescribing Decisions and Diabetes, run by University of Pittsburgh at 1 site in United States.
The full registered description is in the About this study section and the official record.
Who may be eligible to take part?
The sponsor lists 4 inclusion and 5 exclusion criteria. Eligibility is decided by the study team after screening, so read the full criteria and contact a listed site.
Is this clinical trial currently recruiting?
The record says: under way, not looking for participants, as of the sponsor's last update on 4 Nov 2026. Status can change between updates, so confirm with the study contact before making plans.
Where is the study taking place?
The record lists 1 site in United States. Whether a site is taking part right now should be confirmed with that site. See every site.
What are the possible benefits and risks?
They depend on the study and the treatment, and no study can promise a benefit. The study team explains the known risks during informed consent, before anyone joins; the record itself does not list them.
Are results available for this study?
This study is still under way. Results are not available in the source record yet.
How can a doctor refer a patient or contact the research team?
The record lists no contact. The official record names the sponsor, who can be asked directly. AzTrials does not enrol participants or take referrals.
What does the primary outcome measure?
Clinician - Change in Prescribing Self-Efficacy (time frame: Baseline and three months post-intervention). It is what the study was designed to measure, not a finding.
Where can I read the original study information?
Does a listing mean the treatment is approved or proven to work?
No. A listing means the study is registered. It does not show that the treatment is safe, works, or is approved by a regulator.
How often is this information updated?
AzTrials copies changed records from ClinicalTrials.gov every night and reloads the whole registry every week. The sponsor last updated this record on 4 Nov 2026.