Opportunity

Interstitial cystitis/bladder pain syndrome (IC/BPS), a condition of chronic pelvic pain and urinary symptoms, affects up to 8 million women in the United States. Managing IC/BPS is costly and challenging: providers have difficulty addressing the complexity of symptoms, which can be biological, psychological, and/or social. Patients have reported feeling unsupported and dismissed by providers.

Intervention 

ERICA 2.0 (educational, remote IC aide) is an educational program for self-management of IC/BPS. Delivered through a text message-based platform, ERICA 2.0 allows patients to choose the type of intervention they want to engage with. Patients can select from three interventions: regulation of the brain-bladder connection (a module based on cognitive behavioral therapy), physical therapy, and mindfulness. 

Each arm offers educational videos designed to empower patients. ERICA 2.0 also sends weekly text-message check-ins to patients to ask about symptoms and offers for a clinician to call them if they respond that their symptoms are bothering them. To enhance its patient-centeredness, the platform incorporates patient-favored language – when referring to the condition and symptom experience, for example.

Impact 

After feasibility and clinical efficacy trials with ERICA 2.0, patients reported improvements in self-efficacy, symptom severity, and how much their symptoms bothered them compared to baseline. Narrative feedback on the program was positive, lauding how much patients learned about their condition, the ability to access treatments on their own time and remotely, and the program bridging the “gap” in their IC/BPS care. In addition, engagement, accuracy, and usability scores for the platform were high.