Protocol of a randomized controlled trial evaluating telehealth delivery of the Brief Alcohol Screening and Intervention for College Students (BASICS) program

Abstract

This study is a randomized controlled trial evaluating a telehealth version of the Brief Alcohol Screening and Intervention for College Students (BASICS) program as an equally efficacious alternative to the traditional in-person implementation. The study will recruit 600 college students from two large public universities in Texas and Missouri. Recruitment will consist of two cohorts at both sites: mandated students (i.e., referrals with alcohol-related sanctions) and volunteers. Eligible volunteer students will report binge drinking (i.e., ≥ 4/5 or more standard drinks in a sitting for women/men) in the past month, at least one negative alcohol-related consequence in the past month, and interest in either decreasing or not increasing their drinking. Eligible mandated students will be referred for violation of alcohol policy at one of the two campuses. Participants will be randomly assigned to receive in-person BASICS, telehealth BASICS (“TeleBASICS”), or the university’s first-line treatment as usual (personalized normative alcohol feedback delivered online). Participants’ drinking behaviors, motivation to change, subjective evaluations of the intervention, and costs associated with participation (e.g., time, travel fares) will be assessed at 1, 3, 6, and 12 months after baseline. Analyses will examine TeleBASICS as an effective, feasible, and scalable strategy for reducing alcohol use among heavy-drinking college students. We expect that TeleBASICS will be as efficacious as in-person BASICS, and both versions will be more effective than a stand-alone normative feedback. If successful, TeleBASICS has the potential to be an accessible and cost-effective option for the prevention and intervention of alcohol misuse. This study was registered on January 15, 2025, through Clinicaltrials.gov ( #NCT06774300 ).