NCT01892631

Text Messaging Reminders for Influenza Vaccine in Primary Care

A Feasibility Study for a Cluster Randomised Trial of Text Messaging Reminders for Influenza Vaccine in Patients Under 65 in Clinical Risk Groups in English Primary Care.

• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 156 (actual)
• Sponsor: London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 18 Years – 64 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Not accepted

Summary

Influenza morbidity and mortality cause a substantial financial burden to the NHS and to the UK as a whole. Influenza vaccine is safe and effective but is required annually because the circulating strain of virus changes each year. In the UK in 2012, the Chief Medical Officer (CMO) recommended that at least 75% of elderly people (aged 65+) and 75% people under 65 with certain chronic conditions (e.g. chronic heart disease, diabetes, asthma, etc) should be vaccinated. While primary care practices are achieving these targets for elderly patients, those set for younger patients with chronic conditions are not being met, with a third of patients being missed in the 2011/12 flu season and with no substantial improvements in uptake in the past decade. Therefore strategies to increase flu vaccine uptake in these patients are required. Previous trials have shown that patient reminders can increase vaccine uptake and in particular, text messaging has shown to work in some populations in the United States as a cheap, simple and effective reminder. However, whether the same is true in UK general practice is unclear. The use of text messaging in the NHS for appointment reminders is also increasing as it is cheap, quick and effective. Text messaging is already used in roughly 30% of practices to remind patients about their flu vaccine but there has been no trial addressing its effectiveness. Therefore, we propose a trial of a text messaging flu vaccine reminder in patients aged under 65 who have a chronic condition. We hypothesise that practices that send a text message will have increased flu vaccine uptake.

Conditions

• Influenza

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
OTHER	Text message influenza vaccination reminder	Practices in the text messaging intervention arm will be asked to send a text message to patients under 65 at risk of influenza.
OTHER	Standard care	Practices in the standard care arm will be asked to proceed with their seasonal influenza campaign as planned.

Timeline

• Start date: 2013-09-01
• Primary completion: 2015-12-01
• Completion: 2015-12-01
• First posted: 2013-07-04
• Last updated: 2016-10-24

Locations

1 site across 1 country: United Kingdom