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Text-messaging Intervention to Support Parents After Their Child's Psychiatric Emergency

Developing and Testing a Text-messaging Intervention to Support Parents After Their Child's Psychiatric Emergency

Who can join

Ages 18 and older · All sexes

Inclusion Criteria:

* Parents or legal guardians of a child ages 11-17;
* Parents or legal guardians must live with their child ≥50% of the time;
* Child must be admitted to the pediatric emergency department for a mental health crisis;
* Child must be discharged home from the emergency department with referrals to outpatient care.

Exclusion Criteria:

* Do not have daily access to a mobile phone that can receive SMS text messages;
* Do not speak and read fluently in English.

About the study

This grant aims to develop and test a text-messaging intervention for parents of children and teens evaluated in the emergency department for a psychiatric emergency and discharged home with outpatient referrals. The intervention for parents will teach parents skills to navigate the mental health services system and build their self-efficacy in managing their child's mental health. This research has the potential to improve services for families seeking emergency psychiatric support, with the goal of facilitating treatment engagement and reducing emergency services utilization using scalable, cost-effective, accessible tools.

What is being tested

• iPEACE: Intervention for Parent Education about Care after the ED (behavioral)
• Text Messaging Reminders Only (behavioral)

Sponsor: Vanderbilt University Medical Center · Participants: 90 · Started: Aug 1, 2024

Contact the study team

• Margaret Benningfield, MD · Phone: 6156128324
• Neil Chaturvedi · Phone: 6159339731

Official record on ClinicalTrials.gov — NCT06456762

Locations in the U.S.

From ClinicalTrials.gov, data retrieved Sep 30, 2026. Each study sets its own eligibility; the study team decides who can join.