Tomnay 2006.

Methods	Setting: a publicly funded sexual health clinic in Melbourne, Vic, Australia Enrolment: participants were enrolled between July 2003 and July 2004 Follow‐up: 1 week after attending the clinic all index patients were contacted via telephone and interviewed by an experienced "contact tracer"
Participants	105 index patients with chlamydia or NGU (76 men and 29 women) were randomised Inclusion criteria Diagnosed with chlamydia or NGU 16 years or older Contactable partners who had not already been notified Spoke English Exclusion criteria No criteria specified
Interventions	Simple patient referral (n = 32) Each index patient received a sealed envelope. In each envelope there were 5 standard partner letters used for contact tracing. Each index patient was asked to pass a letter to each partner Patient referral with website (n = 73) Each index patient received a sealed envelope. In each envelope there were 5 standard letters used for contact tracing with addition of a uniform resource locator address to a disease‐specific website. Each index patient was asked to pass a letter to each partner. The sites provided information for the partners about the infection to which they had been exposed. A printable letter for the partner to take to their own doctor and an anonymous questionnaire were available on the website. Contact details of the researchers and ethics committee were available to report any complaints
Outcomes	Primary outcome To determine the acceptability of the Internet for use in standard PN (follow‐up telephone interview with index patient) Secondary outcome Partners elicited (follow‐up telephone interview with index patient) Partners located (follow‐up telephone interview with index patient) Index re‐infection (clinic records) Harms ‐ complaints and reaction (follow‐up telephone interview with index patient and opportunity for partner on website)
Notes	Ethical approval by the Department of Human Services, Victoria and the University of Melbourne
Risk of bias
Bias	Authors' judgement	Support for judgement
Random sequence generation (selection bias)	Low risk	Statistical package for Social Sciences (SPSS Inc., Chicago, USA) to generate random numbers between 1 and 27. Block randomisation was used (blocks of 27), with 18 randomised to the website and 9 to the standard letter. This was performed so that each clinic room had 1 randomised block
Allocation concealment (selection bias)	Low risk	The envelopes with the website or standard pack were identical. Thickened opaque paper and were thoroughly sealed. No opened or missing envelopes were identified during the study
Incomplete outcome data (attrition bias) All outcomes	Low risk	97/105 (92%) index patients completed study up to telephone interview. Only 48/105 (46%) index patients returned to the clinic to evaluate re‐infection
Selective reporting (reporting bias)	Low risk	Same outcomes reported that is stated in methods. No protocol available from 3 trial registries
Other bias	Low risk	No other risk of bias identified
Blinding of participants and personnel (performance bias) All outcomes	High risk	Blinding was not possible
Blinding of outcome assessment (detection bias) All outcomes	Unclear risk	No blinding Contact tracer: not clear if contact tracer was blinded. Participants were contacted via telephone 1 week after attending the clinic and were interviewed by an experienced contact tracer regarding the number of partners contacted, the method used whether the letter had been passed on and the reaction of the partner(s) to the method used. A questionnaire was used but no details given on whether this was a structured questionnaire Study personnel: to assess re‐infection of index patient, the study personnel looked at medical files in the 2‐12 week period post‐treatment