Clinical trial · Interventional
Pre-consultation Compassion Among Patients Referred to a Cancer Center
A Pre-consultation Compassion Intervention to Reduce Anxiety Among Patients Referred to a Cancer Center
- Source
- ClinicalTrials.gov
- Retrieved
- Sep 8, 2026
- Layer
- normalized (units and labels harmonized; values unchanged)
- Run
- ING-CLINICALTRIALS-20260908-000001
Summary
Brief summary (as posted)
Patients diagnosed with cancer commonly have a high degree of anxiety during an initial oncology consultation, which may interfere with a patient's ability to retain information required to make informed treatment decisions. A previous study randomized breast cancer survivors (volunteers) to view either (a) a brief video depicting a standard initial consultation from an oncologist or (b) an identical consultation with the addition of compassionate statements from the oncologist, and found the compassionate statements reduced anxiety among the volunteers. However, it is currently unknown if watching a video containing compassionate statements from an oncologist prior to an actual initial oncology consultation will reduce anxiety among patients referred to a cancer center. The aim of this randomized control trial is to test if watching a brief video containing compassionate statements from an oncologist, compared to watching a standard introduction video, prior to an initial oncology consultation will reduce the degree of anxiety among patients referred to a cancer center. This is a prospective, randomized controlled clinical trial at an academic cancer center. The investigators will enroll adult patients scheduled for an initial oncology consultation. Subjects will be randomly assigned to receive a "standard introduction video" or "enhanced compassion video" for viewing prior to the initial oncology consultation. On arrival to the cancer center anxiety severity will be measured using the Hospital Anxiety and Depression scale (HADS). The HADS has two 7-item subscales (HADS Anxiety and HADS Depression) and is well-validated among oncology patients. Wilcoxon rank-sum test will be used to test for a difference in the HADS subscales between the two video groups.
Conditions
Conditions (4)
Free-text conditions as registered, with the CancerIndex entity they were reconciled to and the match type.
| Condition (as posted) | Mapped entity | Match | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| Anxiety | — | UNRESOLVED | — |
| Cancer | Malignant Neoplasm | ALIAS | 0.90 |
| Compassion | — | UNRESOLVED | — |
| Empathy | — | UNRESOLVED | — |
Interventions
Interventions (2)
| Intervention | Type | Mapped drug | Match |
|---|---|---|---|
| Enhanced compassion video | Other | — | UNRESOLVED |
| Standard introduction video | Other | — | UNRESOLVED |
Design
Arms and outcomes
Arms (2)
- type
- ACTIVE_COMPARATOR
- label
- Standard introduction video
- interventionNames
- Other: Standard introduction video
- type
- EXPERIMENTAL
- label
- Enhanced compassion video
- interventionNames
- Other: Enhanced compassion video
Primary outcomes (1)
- measure
- Anxiety Subscale of the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS)
- timeFrame
- Baseline (on arrival to the cancer center for an initial oncology consultant).
- description
- Seven item subscale. Each item is scored on a 4-point scale (0=not at all to 3=nearly all the time); thus, range from 0-21. Higher score indicates greater anxiety.
Eligibility
Eligibility (as posted)
- Sex
- All
- Minimum age
- 18 Years
Show eligibility criteria text
Inclusion Criteria: * age ≥ 18 years * scheduled for an initial oncology consultation Exclusion Criteria: * patients who do not have an active email address or are medically unable to complete the research questionnaire at the time of the initial cancer consultation.
References
Publications (2)
- DERIVEDWinn C, Grana G, Mazzarelli A, Nicholson A, Mykulowycz K, Obiakor C, Bair A, Trzeciak S, Roberts B. Preconsultation compassion video to reduce anxiety among patients referred to a cancer centre: a randomised control trial. BMJ Oncol. 2024 Aug 6;3(1):e000427. doi: 10.1136/bmjonc-2024-000427. eCollection 2024. PMID 39886127
- DERIVEDWinn C, Generosa G, Mazzarelli A, Trzeciak S, Roberts BW. Preconsultation compassion intervention to reduce anxiety among patients referred to a cancer center: protocol for a randomised control trial. BMJ Open. 2021 May 24;11(5):e048201. doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2020-048201. PMID 34031118