Background:
Although care pathways are often said to promote teamwork, high-level evidence thatsupports this statement is lacking. Furthermore, knowledge on conditions and facilitators forsuccessful pathway implementation is scarce. The objective of the European Quality of CarePathway (EQCP) study is therefore to study the impact of care pathways on interprofessionalteamwork and to build up understanding on the implementation process.
Methods:
An international post-test-only cluster Randomised Controlled Trial (cRCT), combined withprocess evaluations, will be performed in Belgium, Ireland, Italy, and Portugal. Teams caringfor proximal femur fracture (PFF) patients and patients hospitalized with an exacerbation ofchronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) will be randomised into an intervention andcontrol group. The intervention group will implement a care pathway for PFF or COPDcontaining three active components: a formative evaluation of the actual teams’ performance,a set of evidence-based key interventions, and a training in care pathway-development. Thecontrol group will provide usual care. A set of team input, process and output indicators willbe used as effect measures. The main outcome indicator will be relational coordination. Nextto these, process measures during and after pathway development will be used to evaluate theimplementation processes. In total, 132 teams have agreed to participate, of which 68 wererandomly assigned to the intervention group and 64 to the control group. Based on poweranalysis, a sample of 475 team members per arm is required. To analyze results, multilevelanalysis will be performed.DiscussionResults from our study will enhance understanding on the active components of carepathways. Through this, preferred implementation strategies can be defined.Trail registrationNCT01435538