Effects of A Nurse-Led Transitional Burns Rehabilitation Programme (4Cs-TBuRP) For Adult Burn Survivors: Protocol for a Randomised Control Trial

Abstract

\n Background: Transitioning from the burn unit to the home/ community can be chaotic with limited professional support. Some adult burn survivors may face varied concerns leading to poor outcomes in the early post-discharge period with limited access to professional help. Based on these, a nurse-led transitional burns rehabilitation programme has been developed and the current trial aims to ascertain its effects as well as explore the implementation process. Methods: A single-centre, double-arm randomised controlled trial with a process evaluation phase will be utilised for this study. All adult burn survivors aged ≥18 years with burn size ≥10% total burn surface area at the site during the study period will be screened for eligibility at least 72hours to discharge. A sample size of 150 will be block randomised to treatment (receiving the nurse-led transitional care programme and routine post-discharge service) and control groups (receiving routine post-discharge service). The nurse-led transitional care programme comprises of predischarge and follow-up phases with the delivery of bundle of holistic interventions lasting for 8 weeks. There are three timelines for data collection: baseline, immediate post-intervention, 4 weeks post-intervention. Discussion: The findings from this study can potentially inform the development and organisation of post-discharge care and affirm the need for ongoing comprehensive home-based care for burn survivors and their families. Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov Trial Registry approved the prospective registration on 20 th August 2020. Registration details can be viewed on https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/record/NCT04517721 .