Dropout, Attrition, Adherence, and Compliance in Mood Monitoring and Ambulatory Assessment Studies for Depression and...

Ambulatory assessment and mood monitoring are different methods that can use novel technology to deliver a more efficient, flexible, and usable method of clinical outcome assessment compared with established measures of behavior and mood. Concerns have been raised around attrition in and adherence to these new protocols, particularly over the medium to long term by people with mood disorders.

This systematic review and meta-analysis assessed attrition from and adherence to active and passive ambulatory assessment and mood monitoring protocols by people with bipolar disorder and depression over the medium and long term.

Randomized controlled trials and nonrandomized studies were identified and rated for risk of bias. Adherence and attrition data were pooled to calculate effect sizes. We analyzed specific factors that we hypothesized a priori could affect the prevalences of attrition and adherence by means of subgroup meta-analysis or metaregression modeling.

We evaluated 77 mood tracking or ambulatory assessment studies including 17,123 participants. Pooled adherence was 0.64% (95% CI 0.59%-0.70%; P<.001), and pooled attrition was 0.28% (95% CI 0.22%-0.34%; P<.001). Three factors had a statistically significant subgroup difference for adherence: The presence of financial incentives increased adherence, and the presence of mood monitoring reminders and a higher study risk of bias decreased adherence. Four factors had a statistically significant subgroup difference for attrition: Digital mood monitoring decreased attrition versus analogue studies, but mood monitoring reminders, mood monitoring versus other protocols, and a high risk of study bias increased attrition. These analyses, however, were vulnerable to confounding by study design and protocol design. Attrition rates were not reported by 17 studies (17/77, 22%), and 20 studies (20/77, 26%) did not report adherence rates. Most studies had a low-to-moderate risk of bias, but heterogeneity was very high. Only 16 studies reported adherence systematically.

Reporting of attrition and adherence to ambulatory assessments was not systematic nor universal, and until it is, analyses are unlikely to demonstrate clear conclusions. We found very high heterogeneity and evidence of publication bias, and this limited the certainty of our conclusions. Financial incentives may increase adherence, and attrition may be lower in digital than analogue studies of mood monitoring. There was no statistically significant difference in adherence and attrition between studies of passive and active ambulatory assessments. Reminders of mood monitoring increased attrition and decreased adherence, but the results may be confounded by longer length of follow-up versus other studies.