An Implementation Science Approach to Evaluating Self-Administered Acupressure for Knee Osteoarthritis in Older-Aged Adults in the Community
This study aims to evaluate the implementation and effectiveness of a self-administered acupressure (SAA) program for knee osteoarthritis (OA) among older adults in Hong Kong community centers. Using a pragmatic cluster randomized controlled trial (RCT) and mixed-methods approach, the research will assess the reach, adoption, implementation, maintenance, and effectiveness of the SAA program in real-world settings, with the goal of informing scalable interventions for knee OA management.
• ethnic Chinese;
• aged 60 years or above;
• able to read Chinese and comprehend Mandarin or Cantonese;
• fulfilling any 3 of the following criteria. i. morning stiffness 30 min; ii. crepitus on active joint motion; iii. bone tenderness; iv. bone enlargement; or v. no palpable joint warmth (this classification on those with age \>50 years yielded 84% sensitivity, and 89% specificity for OA knee diagnosis (25));
• having knee pain for at least 3 months (26);
• knee pain 23 on a Likert pain scale from 1-10;
• having a smartphone (or a family member living together having a smartphone) that is compatible with WhatsApp (based on our previous studies, almost every eligible subject is used to using WhatsApp for social communication); and
• willing to provide informed consent.