A Personalized eHealth Transition Concept for Adolescents With Inflammatory Bowel Disease: Design of Intervention

Factors influencing the healthcare transition in Chinese adolescents with inflammatory bowel disease: a multi-perspective qualitative study

BACKGROUND

The development and implementation of the transition from pediatric to adult healthcare systems for adolescents with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) should consider stakeholders' perceptions. This study aimed to explore the factors influencing the transition of Chinese adolescents with IBD from the perspectives of patients, parents, and healthcare providers.

METHODS

A descriptive qualitative research was conducted. Purposive sampling was used to recruit 36 participants, including 13 patients, 13 parents, and 10 providers, from a tertiary pediatric IBD center, a tertiary adult IBD center, and the China Crohn's & Colitis Foundation in Zhejiang Province, China. Individual semi-structured interviews were used to collect data on facilitators and barriers to the transition process. Conventional content analysis was used to analyze the interview transcripts.

RESULTS

Nine primary themes were identified. Patients with young age, prolonged disease duration, severe disease, academic pressures such as the Gaokao, low level of disease acceptance, limited transition consciousness, low self-efficacy, poor transition communication, and inadequate medical transition system serve as barriers. While patients with the mentality of guilt towards their parents; parents with low education levels and intensive work schedules, high levels of disease acceptance, and situations of parent-child separation; stakeholders with high transition consciousness, high transition self-efficacy, and effective transition communication act as facilitators. Furthermore, community support and hospital guide services were also contributing factors during the transition.

CONCLUSIONS

This study offers comprehensive insights into the factors affecting the transition of Chinese adolescent IBD patients. The process is continuously influenced by stakeholders, community, and healthcare environments and policies. Identifying these factors provides healthcare providers with a reference for developing and implementing targeted transition interventions.

Hungarian Linguistic, Cross-Cultural and Age Adaptation of Transition Specific Questionnaires in Patients with Inflammatory Bowel Disease

Objective: In the TRANS-IBD clinical trial, the outcomes are measured with selected validated questionnaires. Cross-cultural and age adaptations of the Self-Efficacy Scale for adolescents and young adults (IBD-SES), the Transition Readiness Assessment Questionnaire (TRAQ), and the Self-Management and Transition Readiness Questionnaire (STARx) were performed. Methods: Linguistic and cultural adaptation was carried out with the usage of reliability coefficients (Cronbach's α coefficients, Spearman's rank correlation), and with confirmatory factor analysis (CFA; root Mean Square Error of Approximation [RMSEA], Comparative Fit Index [CFI], and Tucker-Lewis Index [TLI]). Results: 112 adolescents participated in the study (45.5% male, mean age 17 ± 1.98 years). CFA was acceptable in the IBD-SES and the TRAQ. Internal consistency was acceptable in IBD-SES and good in TRAQ (0.729; 0.865, respectively). Test-retest reliability was good in IBD-SES, but below the acceptable threshold in TRAQ (ρ = 0.819; ρ = 0.034). In STARx tools, RMSEA showed poor fit values, CFI and TLI were below acceptable fit values, and internal consistency was not satisfied (0.415; 0.693, respectively), while test-retest reliabilities were acceptable (ρ = 0.787; ρ = 0.788, respectively). Conclusions: Cross-cultural, age-specific adaptation was successfully completed with IBD-SES and TRAQ. Those are comparable to the original validated versions. The adaption of the STARx tools was not successful.

Transition of Adolescents with Inflammatory Bowel Disease-Are the Pediatric Teams up to the Task?

Our aim was to describe the challenges of the transition process of adolescents with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), as seen from a pediatric-care perspective, to clarify the key obstacles and propose how to move forward. Semi-structured individual interviews of pediatric gastroenterologists and nurses were analyzed and interpreted according to the principles of social science. It is a challenge for the pediatric team to continuously match, support, and gently guide the ever-changing adolescent patient. All adolescent patients should be offered guidance regardless of their starting point, and specific individual needs should be taken into consideration. Adolescents burdened by psychosocial challenges require extra support. Early and continued interdisciplinary effort is essential. Collaboration with the parents must be continuously adapted to prepare them for their new roles and responsibilities. The shift from the pediatric family-focused approach to the individualistic approach of the Adult Gastroenterology Department signifies a fundamental change. Equipping adolescents with disease-management skills remains a comprehensive task. The following crucial questions remain: Who is capable of performing the transition? Who can dedicate the necessary resources for performing the transition? A transition center led by both pediatricians and adult gastroenterologists in an interdisciplinary setting that includes transition-trained persons may be the solution.

Inflammatory Bowel Disease Nurses' Perspectives: Prioritizing Adolescent Transition Readiness Factors

PURPOSE

Despite the wealth of knowledge and expertise that Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) nurses bring to the transition process, health literature lacks nurses' perspectives on transition readiness. The purpose of study was to ask IBD nurses to prioritize care transition readiness factors for adolescents living with IBD.

DESIGN AND METHODS

The cross-sectional exploratory survey was researcher-developed and distributed online to IBD nurses across Canada. The survey was divided into nine transition topic categories.

RESULTS

Fifty-six female registered nurses from six Canadian provinces participated in the study. Overall, nurses rated all items within each transition topic category to be very important in facilitating adolescent transition to adult healthcare. The highest individual mean scores and the highest prioritized categories were within the Knowing IBD and Healthcare Provider Relationships categories, emphasizing the importance for adolescents to understand their disease and feel comfortable communicating their needs and questions to healthcare providers.

CONCLUSIONS

The transition process needs to be individualized and comprehensive addressing a multitude of biopsychosocial factors in order to support IBD patients and families to achieve healthy adult self-care behaviours that can foster positive health outcomes.

PRACTICE IMPLICATIONS

Healthcare providers, adolescents, and parents must work collaboratively to achieve identified transition goals so that the transition process is a mutually satisfying experience. A comprehensive readiness assessment tool is suggested to assist in the transition process. Transition readiness assessment must start early, be ongoing, be age-appropriate, and be individualized to the patient needs.

Stigmatisation and resilience in inflammatory bowel disease

Inflammatory bowel disease, which includes Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis, is an immune-mediated, chronic relapsing disorder characterised by severe gastrointestinal symptoms that dramatically impair patients' quality of life, affecting psychological, physical, sexual, and social functions. As a consequence, patients suffering from this condition may perceive social stigmatisation, which is the identification of negative attributes that distinguish a person as different and worthy of separation from the group. Stigmatisation has been widely studied in different chronic conditions, especially in mental illnesses and HIV-infected patients. There is a growing interest also for patients with inflammatory bowel disease, in which the possibility of disease flare and surgery-related issues seem to be the most important factors determining stigmatisation. Conversely, resilience represents the quality that allows one to adopt a positive attitude and good adjustments despite adverse life events. Likewise, resilience has been studied in different populations, age groups, and chronic conditions, especially mental illnesses and cancer, but little is known about this issue in patients with inflammatory bowel disease, even if this could be an interesting area of research. Resilience can be strengthened through dedicated interventions that could potentially improve the ability to cope with the disease. In this paper, we focus on the current knowledge of stigmatisation and resilience in patients with inflammatory bowel disease.