Molly Byrne

University of Galway | NUI Galway · School of Psychology

Background: Sexual problems are common among people with cardiovascular disease. Although clinical guidelines recommend sexual counselling for patients and their partners, there is little evidence on its effectiveness. Objectives: To evaluate the effectiveness of sexual counselling interventions (in comparison to usual care) on sexuality-related ou...

While cardiac secondary prevention in primary care is established practice, little is known about its long-term cost effectiveness. This study examines the cost effectiveness of a secondary prevention intervention in primary care in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland over 6 years. An economic evaluation, based on a cluster randomised cont...

Objective To determine the long-term effectiveness of a complex intervention in primary care aimed at improving outcomes for patients with coronary heart disease. Design A 6-year follow-up of a cluster randomised controlled trial, which found after 18 months that both total and cardiovascular hospital admissions were significantly reduced in interv...

Background: Multimorbidity, the presence of two or more chronic conditions, affects over 60 % of patients in primary care. Due to its association with polypharmacy, the development of interventions to optimise medication management in patients with multimorbidity is a priority. The Behaviour Change Wheel is a new approach for applying behavioural...

Young adulthood is a time of significant challenges and risks for people with type 1 diabetes. Poor outpatient clinic attendance is common among young adults with type 1 diabetes. The aim of this qualitative study was to develop a theory explaining attendance at a hospital-based diabetes clinic. Using a grounded theory methodology, data were collec...

Objective Digital cardiac rehabilitation (CR) has emerged as a promising alternative to in‐person CR. Understanding patients' experiences and perceptions can provide valuable insights into what makes these programmes successful and identify opportunities for improvement. This study aimed to explore patients' experiences of digital CR and to underst...

Background: Digital health interventions (DHIs) are increasingly used for the secondary prevention of cardiovascular disease (CVD). The aim of this study is to determine the feasibility of “INTERCEPT”, a co-designed DHI developed to improve secondary prevention in hospitalised coronary heart disease patients (CHD). Methods: This non-randomised feas...

Background: Hypertension is one of the most important risk factors for stroke and heart disease. Recent international guidelines have stated that 'poor adherence to treatment – in addition to physician inertia - is the most important cause of poor blood pressure control'. The MaxImising Adherence, Minimising Inertia (MIAMI) intervention, which has...

Funding Acknowledgements Type of funding sources: Public Institution(s). Main funding source(s): Health Research Board, Ireland SOLVE CHD SYNERGY Grant, University of Sydney, Australia Background Co-design adopts a participatory, person-centred approach to the development of health interventions, which aims to maximise their acceptance and effecti...

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the uptake of digital health interventions for the delivery of cardiac rehabilitation (CR). However, there is a need to evaluate these interventions. Methods: We examined the impact of an evidence-based, digital CR programme on medical, lifestyle and psychosocial outcomes. Delivered by an interdiscip...

Evidence suggests that digitally delivered cardiac rehabilitation (CR) is likely to be an effective alternative to centre-based CR. However, there is limited understanding of the behaviour change techniques (BCTs) and intervention characteristics included in digital CR programmes. This systematic review aimed to identify the BCTs and intervention c...

Objectives: The public health impact of the Irish Making Every Contact Count (MECC) brief intervention programme is dependent on delivery by health care professionals. We aimed to identify enablers and modifiable barriers to MECC intervention delivery to optimize MECC implementation. Design: Online cross-sectional survey design. Methods: Healt...

Background: Hypertension is one of the most important risk factors for stroke and heart disease. Recent international guidelines have stated that 'poor adherence to treatment – in addition to physician inertia - is the most important cause of poor blood pressure control'. The MaxImising Adherence, Minimising Inertia (MIAMI) intervention, which has...

COVID-19 research has relied heavily on convenience-based samples, which—though often necessary—are susceptible to important sampling biases. We begin with a theoretical overview and introduction to the dynamics that underlie sampling bias. We then empirically examine sampling bias in online COVID-19 surveys and evaluate the degree to which common...

Objectives: This is a protocol for a Cochrane Review (intervention). The objectives are as follows:. The aim of this review is to determine the effectiveness of knowledge translation interventions for facilitating evidence-informed decision-making amongst health policymakers. Copyright © 2022 The Cochrane Collaboration. Published by John Wiley & So...

Background While international guidelines recommend medication reviews as part of the management of multimorbidity, evidence on how to implement reviews in practice in primary care is lacking. The MyComrade (MultimorbiditY Collaborative Medication Review And Decision Making) intervention is an evidence-based, theoretically informed novel interventi...

Funding Acknowledgements Type of funding sources: Public grant(s) – National budget only. Main funding source(s): Government of Ireland's Sláintecare Integration Fund Health Research Board, Ireland Background & Aim COVID 19 has accelerated the uptake and acceptance of digital health tools for the prevention and management of Cardiovascular Disease...

Background While international guidelines recommend medication reviews as part of the management of multimorbidity, evidence on how to implement reviews in practice in primary care is lacking. The MultimorbiditY Collaborative Medication Review And Decision Making (MyComrade) intervention is an evidence-based, theoretically informed novel interventi...

Background: Core outcome sets (COS) represent agreed-upon sets of outcomes, which are the minimum that should be measured and reported in all trials in specific health areas. Use of COS can reduce outcome heterogeneity, selective outcome reporting, and research waste, and can facilitate evidence syntheses. Despite benefits of using COS, current use...

Background The D1 Now intervention is designed to improve outcomes in young adults living with type 1 diabetes. It consists of three components: an agenda-setting tool, an interactive messaging system and a support worker. The aim of the D1 Now pilot cluster randomised controlled trial (RCT) was to gather and analyse acceptability and feasibility d...

Background: Brief behavioural interventions offered by healthcare professionals to target health behavioural risk factors (e.g. physical activity, diet, smoking and drug and alcohol use) can positively impact patient health outcomes. The Irish Health Service Executive (HSE) Making Every Contact Count (MECC) Programme supports healthcare professiona...

Background Optimising physical distancing measures has been a critical part of the global response to the spread of COVID-19. Adherence to these recommendations has been poorer than adherence to other key transmission reduction behaviours. The current project aimed to identify psychosocial determinants of adherence to physical distancing, and to de...

Objectives: Digitally-delivered diabetes prevention programmes (DPPs) may improve population health by reversing the escalating trend of type 2 diabetes (T2D) incidence. Understanding the factors which determine digital health acceptability is critical to developing effective interventions. This study aimed to develop and test a digital health acc...

Background: Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the leading cause of death worldwide. Cardiac rehabilitation (CR) is a complex intervention that aims to stabilise, slow, or reverse the progression of CVD and improve patients’ functional status and quality of life. Digitally delivered CR has been shown to be effective and can overcome many of the access...

Funding Acknowledgements Type of funding sources: Public Institution(s). Main funding source(s): Community Engaged Scholars Programme (CES-P), PPI Ignite, National University of Ireland, Galway Background Despite the well-established benefits of cardiovascular prevention and rehabilitation, programme uptake rates remain suboptimal. Delivering card...

Background: Effective government communications and leadership are central to the management of pandemics. Behavioural science can offer important insight into the development of such communications strategies. The extent to which established behaviour-change science is reflected in current government messaging campaigns to promote adherence to phy...

Background: Physical distancing measures (e.g., keeping a distance of two metres from others, avoiding crowded areas, and reducing the number of close physical contacts) continue to be among the most important preventative measures used to reduce the transmission of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) that causes coronaviru...

Background: Despite the effectiveness of hand hygiene (HH) for infection control, there is a lack of robust scientific data to guide how HH can be improved in intensive care units (ICUs). The aim of this study is to use the literature, researcher, and stakeholder opinion to explicate potential interventions for improving HH compliance in the ICU, a...

Background: Despite the effectiveness of hand hygiene (HH) for infection control, there is a lack of robust scientific data to guide how HH can be improved in intensive care units (ICUs). The aim of this study is to use the literature, researcher, and stakeholder opinion to explicate potential interventions for improving HH compliance in the ICU, a...

This scoping review focused on answering key questions about the focus, quality and generalisability of the quantitative evidence on the determinants of adherence to social distancing measures in research during the first wave of COVID-19. The review included 84 studies. The majority of included studies were conducted in Western Europe and the USA....

Background: Physical distancing measures (e.g., keeping a distance of two metres from others, avoiding crowded areas, and reducing the number of close physical contacts) continue to be among the most important preventative measures used to reduce the transmission of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) that causes coronaviru...

Objectives: Despite evidence that cardiac rehabilitation (CR) can be effective, the active ingredients or behaviour change techniques (BCTs) constituting effective CR remain unclear. There is also a lack of research surrounding patient and facilitator perceptions of active ingredients. This study sought to identify the active ingredients of a comm...

Background: Physical distancing measures (i.e., limiting physical contact with people outside of one’s household, maintaining a 2-metre distance between oneself and others, avoiding non-essential travel, etc.) are among the primary strategies used to prevent transmission of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Thes...

Health psychology is at the forefront of developing and disseminating evidence, theories, and methods that have improved the understanding of health behaviour change. However, existing evidence dissemination approaches may be insufficient for promoting the broader application and impact of findings to benefit the health of patients and the public....

Objective: Early-life nutrition plays a key role in establishing healthy lifestyles and preventing chronic disease. This study aimed to 1) explore healthcare professionals’ (HCP) opinions on the acceptability of and factors influencing the delivery of interventions to promote healthy infant feeding behaviours within primary care, and 2) identify pr...

Optimising public health physical distancing measures has been a critical part of the global response to the spread of COVID-19. Evidence collected during the current pandemic shows that the transmission rate of the virus is significantly reduced following implementation of intensive physical distancing measures. Adherence to these recommendations...

Objective : To examine whether symptoms of depression or anxiety predict glycaemia and incident diabetes complications four years later, and whether diabetes self-care behaviours mediate these associations, in adults with type 1 diabetes (T1DM). Methods : Data of 205 adults with T1DM from the 2011 and 2015 Diabetes MILES–Australia surveys were ana...

Aims To identify all extant instruments used to measure diabetes distress in adults with Type 1 diabetes and to evaluate the evidence for the measurement properties of these instruments. Methods Medline, Embase, CINAHL plus and PsycINFO were systematically searched from inception up until 12 March 2020 for all publications which evaluated the psyc...

Background: Standardisation of outcomes measured and reported in trials of infant-feeding interventions to prevent childhood obesity is essential to evaluate and synthesise intervention effects. The aim of this study is to develop an infant-feeding core outcome set for use in randomised trials of infant-feeding interventions, with children ≤1 year...

Background: The WHO has declared the outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) as a pandemic. With no vaccine currently available, using behavioural measures to reduce the spread of the virus within the population is an important tool in mitigating the effects of this pandemic. As such, social distancing measures are being implemented globall...

Background The CHErIsH Choosing Healthy Eating for Infant Health intervention is a brief intervention to be delivered during routine vaccination visits, to improve healthy infant feeding behaviours among parents to help reduce the risk of childhood obesity. An accompanying implementation strategy was designed to support delivery of CHErIsH by healt...

Optimising public health physical distancing measures has been a critical part of the global response to the spread of COVID-19. Evidence collected during the current pandemic shows that the transmission rate of the virus is significantly reduced following implementation of intensive physical distancing measures. Adherence to these recommendations...

Policy brief to accompany "Barriers to seasonal influenza vaccine uptake among health care workers in long-term care facilities: A cross-sectional analysis"

Background: The WHO has declared the outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) as a pandemic. With no vaccine currently available, using behavioural measures to reduce the spread of the virus within the population is an important tool in mitigating the effects of this pandemic. As such, social distancing measures are being implemented globall...

Policy brief to accompany "“They Just Need to Come Down a Little Bit to Your Level”: A Qualitative Study of Parents’ Views and Experiences of Early Life Interventions to Promote Healthy Growth and Associated Behaviours"

Background Young adults (aged 18–25 years) living with type 1 diabetes mellitus often have sub‐optimal glycaemic levels, which can increase their risk of long‐term diabetes complications. Informed by health psychology theory and using a young adult‐centred approach (public and patient involvement), we have developed a complex intervention, entitled...

The first 1000 days is a critical window of opportunity to promote healthy growth and associated behaviours. Health professionals can play an important role, in part due to the large number of routine contacts they have with parents. There is an absence of research on the views of parents towards obesity prevention and the range of associated behav...

Background: Improving hand hygiene (HH) compliance is one of the most important, but elusive, goals of infection control. The purpose of this study was to use the capability (C), opportunity (O), motivation (M), and behaviour (B; COM-B) model and the theoretical domains framework (TDF) to gain an understanding of the barriers and enablers of HH be...

Objectives The vaccination of health care workers (HCWs) against influenza is recommended by numerous public health authorities. Despite these recommendations, the rate of vaccine uptake is poor, particularly among those working in long‐term care. The current study aimed to use the theoretical domains framework to identify the barriers associated w...

Objectives: Our aim was to conduct a systematic review to determine which technology-driven diabetes prevention interventions were effective in producing clinically significant weight loss, and to identify the behaviour change techniques and digital features frequently used in effective interventions. Methods: We searched five databases (CINAHL, EM...

Background: Non-communicable chronic diseases are linked to behavioral risk factors (including smoking, poor diet and physical inactivity), so effective behavior change interventions are needed to improve population health. However, uptake and impact of these interventions is limited by methodological challenges. We aimed to identify and achieve c...

This chapter will discuss psychosocial health and outline some of the evidence and issues relevant to cardiovascular prevention and rehabilitation settings. It examines why psychosocial health is important for preventive, restorative, and supportive rehabilitation. There is a focus on practical applications of the psychological evidence base in the...

Background: Interventions to change behaviour have substantial potential to impact positively on individual and overall public health. Despite an increasing focus on health behaviour change intervention research, interventions do not always have the desired effect on outcomes, while others have diluted effects once implemented into real-life settin...

Policy Brief to accompany the following article: Hennessy, M, Heary, C, Laws, R, Van Rhoon L, Toomey E, Wolstenholme H, Byrne B. The effectiveness of health professional‐delivered interventions during the first 1000 days to prevent overweight/obesity in children: A systematic review. Obesity Reviews. 2019; 20(12):1691-1707. https://doi.org/10.111...

Objectives We developed a complex intervention called DECIDE (Computerise D d EC is I onal support for suboptimally controlle D typ E 2 D iabetes mellitus in Irish General Practice) which used a clinical decision support system to address clinical inertia and support general practitioner (GP) intensification of treatment for adults with suboptimall...

Objectives and Design: There is growing recognition of the need for effective behaviour change interventions to prevent chronic diseases that are feasible and sustainable and can be implemented within routine health care systems. Focusing on implementation from the outset of intervention development, and incorporating multiple stakeholder perspecti...

Behaviour is central to the management of diabetes, both for people living with diabetes and for healthcare professionals delivering evidence‐based care. This review outlines the evolution of behavioural science and the application of theoretical models in diabetes care over the past 25 years. There has been a particular advancement in the developm...

Background: Behaviour change techniques (BCTs) employed within PA intervention for pregnant women with a healthy body mass index (BMI) have been previously identified, however, these BCTS may differ for other weight profiles during pregnancy. The aim of this current review was to identify and summarise the evidence for effectiveness of PA interven...

Background: Childhood obesity prevention interventions delivered by health professionals during the first 1,000 days of life show some evidence of effectiveness, particularly in relation to behavioural outcomes. External validity refers to how generalisable interventions are to populations or settings beyond those in the original study. The degree...

Background: Childhood obesity is a global public health challenge. While early intervention is advocated, research on the views of parents, including fathers, in this area is limited. Developed with the input of a parent advisory group, this study examines parents’ views on healthy growth and associated behaviours, and specifically health professio...

Childhood obesity is a global public health challenge. Early prevention, particularly during the first 1000 days, is advocated. Health professionals have a role to play in obesity prevention efforts, in part due to the multiple routine contacts they have with parents. We synthesized the evidence for the effectiveness of obesity prevention intervent...

Aim The aim of this study was to identify and summarise the effectiveness of physical activity (PA) interventions on PA levels for pregnant women with overweight and obesity, with a specific emphasis on the behaviour change techniques (BCTs) employed. Methods A systematic review and meta-analysis of PA intervention studies using the PRISMA stateme...

Introduction Childhood obesity is a public health challenge. There is evidence for associations between parents’ feeding behaviours and childhood obesity risk. Primary care provides a unique opportunity for delivery of infant feeding interventions for childhood obesity prevention. Implementation strategies are needed to support infant feeding inter...

Childhood obesity is a significant public health challenge, yet research priorities for childhood obesity prevention are not established. Coproduction of priorities leads to research which may be more translatable to the domains of policy and practice. The aim of the present study was to identify knowledge gaps and research priorities in addition t...

Background: Childhood obesity prevention interventions delivered by health professionals during the first 1,000 days show some evidence of effectiveness, particularly in relation to behavioural outcomes. External validity refers to how generalisable interventions are to populations or settings beyond those in the original study. The degree to which...

Objective The aim of this study was to identify the social, biological, behavioural and psychological factors related to physical activity (PA) in early pregnancy. Design This is a secondary analysis of data from a prospective cohort study. Setting The study was conducted in Cork, Ireland. Participants Nulliparous women with singleton pregnancie...

Background: The first 1,000 days is a critical window of opportunity for promoting healthy growth and associated behaviours in young children. Health professionals have a role to play in interventions, in part due to the multiple routine contacts they have with parents. While reviews to date have synthesised the evidence for the effectiveness of ob...