FindWays: testing a co-designed website for parents to find ways to help their child’s behaviour or emotions

INTERVENTION: A statistician not directly involved in the analysis of the trial results will prepare the randomisation schedule. The randomisation schedule will be created by computer‐generated random numbers, before the first participant has been recruited. The participant cohort will be stratified by child age (2‐6 years old and 7‐12 years old) and clinic. Within each strata, permuted block randomisation will be used to ensure balance between the website and control group. A randomly generated sequence of block sizes containing 2, 4, or 6 participants will be used. This will help ensure balance in numbers between website and control groups, prevent potential confounders of age or clinic type impacting the measurement of outcomes, and prevent any predictability in website allocation. The schedule will be held by an independent statistician, and allocation will not be revealed prematurely to CI Peyton. Because of these procedures, the research team will be unable to predict which group the participant will be allocated to. The intervention consists of access to a new, co‐designed website. This website, FindWays, offers parents relevant, credible and specific information on behavioural and emotional problems. Hopefully, this will help the parent find ways to help their child's problem while they wait to see a paediatrician, over and above their usual supports (e.g., general practitioner). This information includes different parenting strategies they can try at home, learn what different professionals or programs can do to help their child, and where to find available professional help. On a semi‐regular basis, parents in the intervention group will be sent a reminder to access the website. These reminders also contain some brief information about the CONDITION: Behavioural and emotional problems in children ; Mental and Behavioural Disorders PRIMARY OUTCOME: ; Feasibility and acceptability are measured using:; 1. Recruitment measured by the number of eligible participants who consent to participate in the study after 3 attempts to contact within a 3‐month recruitment period; 2. Retention measured by the number of consenting participants in the intervention group who access the website as measured by Google Analytics continuously over the 4‐month trial; 3. Likelihood of recommending the intervention as measured by a Likert scale (0‐10) net promoter score at 4 months; 4. Usability and safety feedback measured by qualitative interview at 4 months; 5. Number of participants who complete all quantitative baseline measures and final measures at 4 months; 6. Number of participants who access the website as measured by Google Analytics within the 4‐month trial period; 7. Tasks completed on the website (e.g. parenting strategies found, suitable professionals found) measured by parent survey at 4 months; SECONDARY OUTCOME: ; 1. Child behaviour and emotions as measured by parent‐reported Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) at baseline and 4 months; 2. Family impact of the child’s behaviour and emotions as measured by parent‐reported SDQ impact statement at baseline and 4 months; 3. Parent mental health and distress as measured by the parent‐reported Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS‐21) at baseline and 4 months; 4. Health services use measured by parent‐reported surveys at 4 months; INCLUSION CRITERIA: 1. Parent or carer of a child aged 2‐12 years at the time of randomisation 2. Referred for a first appointment with a paediatrician to manage a behavioural or emotional problem 3. Has a behavioural or emotional problem as listed for review on the referral letter 4. Provide a verbal consent that is signed and dated by the researcher