Motivational interviewing increases physical activity and self-efficacy in people living in the community after hip fracture: a randomized controlled trial

Objective: To investigate if motivational interviewing improved physical activity, self-efficacy, quality of life, mobility and mental health in people living in the community after hip fracture. Design: Single-blind randomized controlled trial. Setting: Community. Participants: A total of 30 adults after hip fracture who had been discharged from rehabilitation to independent living in the community and allocated to a control group ( n = 14) or an intervention group ( n = 16). Intervention: All participants received usual care. The intervention group also received eight weekly sessions of motivational interviewing as additional input, with the control group having no additional matching input. Main outcomes: The primary outcome was physical activity levels as measured by an accelerometer (steps taken per day, time spent walking per day, and time spent sitting or lying each day). Secondary outcomes included self-efficacy (confidence about walking and not falling), health-related quality of life, mobility and mental health. Results: Relative to usual care, the motivational interviewing group took significantly more steps per day (mean = 1237 steps, 95% confidence interval (CI) 12 to 2463), walked for longer per day (mean = 14.4 minutes, 95% CI 0.6 to 28.8), had improved self-efficacy evidenced by being more confident about walking (mean = 1.6 units out of 10, 95% CI 0.3 to 2.9) and not falling (mean = 1.1 units out of 10, 95% CI 0.3 to 1.9) and improved health-related quality of life and mental health. Conclusion: This study provides preliminary evidence that motivational interviewing can result in clinically meaningful improvements in physical activity and psychosocial outcomes for people recovering from hip fracture.