Arthur 2002
| Methods | Purpose: to compare the effect of offering home health checks to appointments in a vaccination clinic on increasing influenza vaccination uptake Design: randomised 1/3 participants to receive 30‐minute health check and offer of influenza vaccine at home, and 2/3 to receive personal letter to attend vaccination clinic in surgery Duration of study: October to 4 December 2000 Interval between intervention and when outcome was measured: letters mailed October 2000; health checks undertaken 2 October to 4 December 2000 Power computation: 99% power at alpha = 0.05 for uptake of 64% in health check group compared to 50% in personal letter group Statistics: Chi2 to analyse difference in uptake between trial arms; ITT | |
| Participants | Country: UK Setting: 34 general practice physicians in Leicestershire Eligible participants: (health status) all 2052 participants >= 75 living in community Age: ≥ 75 years Gender: 60% female | |
| Interventions | Intervention 1: health check at home Intervention 2: invitation to attend vaccination clinic | |
| Outcomes | Outcome measured: % influenza vaccination; how receipt of vaccine was recorded not stated, but as is single practice, sole purpose of this intervention in influenza vaccination, and vaccination clinics and home visits are by practice nurses can be expected to be complete Time points from the study that are considered in the review or measured or reported in the study: 2 October to 4 December 2000 % vaccinated by 31 December 2000 | |
| Notes | Funding: Melton, Rutland and Harborough Primary Care Group, Leicestershire Health | |
| Risk of bias | ||
| Bias | Authors' judgement | Support for judgement |
| Random sequence generation (selection bias) | Low risk | SAS data analysis program assigned codes |
| Allocation concealment (selection bias) | Unclear risk | No statement |
| Blinding (performance bias and detection bias) All outcomes | Unclear risk | No statement |
| Incomplete outcome data (attrition bias) All outcomes | Low risk | Of 2408 participants, 356 in nursing home or sheltered accomodation; of 680 randomised to health check, 468 received health check and 680 followed up; of 1372 randomised to personal letter, 66 received flu vaccine at home and 1372 followed up |
| Selective reporting (reporting bias) | Low risk | No selective reporting |