Lessons learnt

• Fidelity of receipt (as defined in the BCC framework, i.e. assessments of participants’ understanding and performance of skill and strategies to enhance these) remains poorly assessed in health intervention research

• Reporting of strategies to enhance receipt, i.e. participants’ understanding and performance of skill, remains particularly low.

• Other frameworks than the BCC have been used to guide fidelity/process evaluation work, but operationalisations of receipt do not always match the definitions of receipt provided in these frameworks

• The reporting of methods used to assess receipt requires improvement. Reporting was unclear in a number of papers, requiring readers to read manuscripts attentively several times to identify how receipt was operationalised and providing no information on the validity/reliability of the methods used

• Quantitative and qualitative methods, or a combination of both, have been used to address fidelity of receipt in health intervention research.

Recommendations for future work

• In the early stages of study design, consider how to address fidelity of receipt both in relation to assessments and strategies to enhance

• Select one or more fidelity frameworks to guide fidelity work (or use an overarching model) and ensure the methods used to assess receipt are consistent with the definitions of receipt in the chosen framework (s) (provide definitions of receipt)

• Clearly differentiate between fidelity components and other constructs when writing papers (e.g. receipt and enactment are different constructs, therefore methods used to assess them need to be described separately, as well as results).

• Address and report on the reliability and validity of the methods used to assess receipt