Design
A quasi-experimental field study was undertaken in three departments of a home nursing organization in the Antwerp region (Belgium) 2012–2013. Each department was similar in size with a monthly average of 581 (sd 70, range 502–637) patients being treated and an average of 17 patients for each home nurse (sd 3, range 14–19). Initially, briefing sessions were organized informing home nurses of their tasks. These consisted of detecting depressive symptoms in their patient population and their family caregivers (onwards we will refer to all participants as ‘patients’, unless when making explicit distinctions between patients and caregivers). To complete this task, home nurses could rely on several screening questions to confirm their suspicions of possible symptoms of depression. Two screening questions for depression were developed by Whooley et al. (1997) and an additional question was suggested by Arroll et al. (2005) to determine whether patients preferred professional support. In case these screening questions indicated that patients were experiencing symptoms of depression and that they preferred help, home nurses could offer patients the possibility to participate in an online intervention for depression or to refer them to local general practitioners (GPs).
In two departments, the briefing was preceded by a minimal intervention. Home nurses in the other department were used as a control group. Data were collected during a baseline assessment and at two follow-ups: a first one at 2 months following the initial intervention and a final one 7 months after the intervention. Furthermore, in the 2 months immediately following the intervention, process measures concerning the number of successful detections and referrals were also gathered.