A randomised controlled trial and consumer characteristics of the Mindful eHealth wellbeing program.

A randomised controlled trial will be used to investigate the effectiveness of the Mindful eHealth program. The Mindful eHealth program is placed within the Federation eHealth Platform. People visiting the website, in response to advertisements or through self interest, will be informed of the availability of the Mindful eHealth program and invited to participate in the study. People taking part in the study will be randomly allocated to either an immediate access to the online program, or delayed assess (15 week delay). The Mindful eHealth program consists of three sessions designed to make an individual more mindful or being aware of moment-to-moment experiences (e.g., thoughts, feelings, images, sensations) and simply accepting what is there and not wanting it to change it in any way. Participants will spend a week on each session before moving onto the next session, so as to practise and to reinforce the session material learnt. Each session will last 15 minutes and its user friendly and interactive components are designed to keep the user engaged. To consolidate learning, participants will be given activities (five minutes per day) to complete offline to practise the principles of mindfulness and asked to provide simple feedback on this practise at the next session. Participants will also be sent automated emails (e.g., reminding them to log on (when they haven't for a period of time), when to complete questionnaires (with automated reminders when they are not completed in a timely manner), when new modules are released). Participants will complete online questionnaires at pre-program, during-program, post-program, and at one and three month follow-up stages of the study and will have access to the eHealth program for the duration of the study.