Introduction
There is a need for enhanced preventive health care among airline pilots to mitigate
the prevalence of cardiometabolic health risk factors.
Design
A randomized, waitlist-controlled trial was utilized to evaluate the effectiveness
of a smartphone-based app intervention for improving health behaviors and cardiometabolic
health parameters.
Setting/participants
A total of 186 airline pilots (aged 43.2±9.1 years; male, 64%) were recruited and
participated in the trial during 2022.
Intervention
This intervention was a personalized, 16-week smartphone-based app multicomponent
physical activity, healthy eating, and sleep hygiene intervention.
Main outcome measures
Outcome measures of objective health (Cooper's 12-minute exercise test, resting heart
rate, push ups, plank isometric hold, body mass), subjective health (self-rated health,
perceived psychological stress and fatigue), and health behaviors (weekly physical
activity, sleep quality and duration, fruit and vegetable intake) were collected at
baseline and after intervention. The waitlist control completed the same measures.
Results
Significant interactions for time Χ group from baseline to 16 weeks were found for
all outcome measures (p<0.001). Significant between-group differences for positive health changes in favor
of the intervention group were found after intervention for all outcome measures (p<0.05, d=0.4–1.0) except for self-rated health, body mass, and Pittsburgh Sleep Quality
Index score.
Conclusions
Study findings show that an app-based health behavior intervention can elicit positive
cardiometabolic health changes among airline pilots over 16 weeks, associated with
trivial to large effect sizes.
Trial registration
The trial protocol was prospectively registered at The Australian New Zealand Clinical
Trials Registry (ACTRN12622000288729).
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Publication history
Published online: January 12, 2023
Publication stage
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© 2022 American Journal of Preventive Medicine. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
