Helping young people with chronic illness make decisions about their care

Adolescents’ involvement in decision making during specialty care visits for pediatric chronic illness: Development and evaluation of a new measure and implications for self-management

NIH-funded research Children's Hosp of Philadelphia · NIH-11089342

This project aims to create a new way to understand how young people, their parents, and doctors work together to make important health decisions during clinic visits for conditions like diabetes.

Quick facts

Grant typeR01 grant
Study typeNIH-funded research
Funding institutionChildren's Hosp of Philadelphia NIH-funded
Lab location1 site (Philadelphia, United States)
Project IDNIH-11089342 on NIH RePORTER

What this research studies

When young people have a chronic illness, it's important for them to be involved in decisions about their health as they grow. This project will talk to young patients, their parents, and their doctors to understand how they currently make decisions together during clinic appointments. We want to create a new tool to better measure how much young people participate in these discussions. This tool will help us learn how different ways of making decisions affect a young person's ability to manage their condition and their overall health.

Who could benefit from this research

Good fit: Ideal candidates would be adolescents with chronic illnesses such as type 1 diabetes, sickle cell disease, juvenile idiopathic arthritis, or inflammatory bowel disease, along with their parents and healthcare providers.

Not a fit: Patients who are not adolescents or do not have one of the specified chronic illnesses may not directly benefit from this particular research.

Why it matters

Potential benefit: If successful, this work could lead to better ways for young people with chronic illnesses to participate in their own care decisions, potentially improving their health and self-management skills.

How similar studies have performed: While the importance of shared decision-making is recognized, there is a lack of specific, reliable tools to measure youth involvement in medical encounters, making this a novel approach.

Where this research is happening

Philadelphia, United States

Researchers

About this research

  1. This is an active NIH-funded research project — typically early-stage science, not a clinical trial accepting patient enrollment.
  2. Some NIH-funded labs run parallel clinical studies or seek volunteers for related work. To check, contact the principal investigator or institution listed above.
  3. For full project details, budget, and progress reports, visit the official NIH RePORTER page below.
Conditions Brittle Diabetes Mellitus
Last reviewed 2026-06-13 by the Find a Trial editorial team. Information on this page is for educational purposes and is not medical advice. Always consult qualified healthcare professionals about clinical trial participation.