Effect of Personalised Citizen Assistance for Social Participation (APIC) on Older Adults' Health and Social Participation: a Pragmatic Multicentre Randomised Controlled Trial (RCT)

Global aging and the growing burden of chronic diseases represent a challenge. Innovative interventions acting upon health determinants, like social participation, are required. Social participation, defined as the involvement of a person in activities that provide interactions with others in the community is critical to promote health and prevent disabilities. Many older adults do not have equitable opportunities to achieve full social participation, and interventions under-empower their personal and environmental resources and only reach a minority. To optimize current practices, the Personalised citizen assistance for social participation (APIC), an intervention demonstrated as being feasible and having positive impacts, needs further evaluation.

The first aim of this study is evaluate the impacts of the APIC on older adults' health, social participation, life satisfaction and healthcare services utilisation. The second aim is to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of the intervention. In parallel, the implementation of the APIC, including factors facilitating and impeding it, will be documented.

Concerning the first two objectives, two hypotheses are formulated: 1) the APIC will prevent a decline in older women's and men's health, social participation and life satisfaction, and reduce their use of healthcare services, and 2) the APIC will be associated with lower costs, from older adults', healthcare system and societal perspectives, including healthcare expenditures.