Are Text Message Reminders an Effective Intervention for Improving the Uptake of Breast Screening?

NCT01977599 | Completed Results

• 2 other identifiers: 7114/P21R12/EM/0418
• Study Type: interventional
• Target: 2,240
• Locations: 1 country
• Sites: 1

Brief Summary

Breast Cancer is the single most common cancer, and the third leading cause of cancer cancer deaths, in the United Kingdom. Breast screening is able to detect breast cancer in the early stages of development, during which time it is more easily treatable. Unfortunately, many patients do not attend screening, and surveys issued to these women consistently report "forgetfulness" as the primary reason for missing the appointment. Both telephone reminders and postal reminders have been shown to reduce non-attendance, however, these are time consuming and expensive. Mobile telephones are becoming an increasingly popular tool for communication between healthcare professionals and patients, one which might offer an inexpensive solution for delivering reminders. Text message reminders have been able to prevent missed appointments in other areas of healthcare, and the same might be true for breast screening. The investigators are conducting a trial to confirm whether this is the case or not. In this trial, the investigators will send some women a text message to reminder them of their appointment, and other women no reminder for their appointment. The investigators will then compare the number of women in each group that went to their breast screening appointment.

Conditions

Breast Screening

Keywords

Text message reminders; Short Message Service (SMS) Reminders; Social Health Inequalities; Breast Screening; Screening; Public Health Intervention; Missed Appointments; Non-attendance

Outcome Measures

Primary Outcomes (1)

• Attendance at Breast Screening

  Number of women that participate in breast screening in the control (no text message reminder) compared with the number of women that participate in the intervention (text message reminder 48 hours before appointment).

  The text message was sent 48 hours before the appointment, attendance was assessed 60 days after the appointment date.

Secondary Outcomes (1)

• Mobile Prevalence

  The accuracy of patient mobile records was assessed for the intervention group at the time the text reminder was sent (i.e. 48 hours before the appointment). A check for the control group was performed at the same time.

Study Arms (2)

No Text Message Reminder (Control) Arm

NO INTERVENTION

Control Arm, in which patients are invited to breast screening as per standard West of London Breast Screening Protocol (i.e. without a text message appointment reminder). Uptake of breast screening in this group will be compared with the text message reminder group to test for significant differences.

Text Message Reminder Arm

EXPERIMENTAL

Patients randomly allocated to this arm of the study will be sent a text message reminding them of the time, date and venue of their breast screening appointment 48 hours in advance.

Other: Text Message Reminder for Breast Screening Appointment

Interventions

Text Message Reminder for Breast Screening Appointment OTHER

Non-clinical/administrative.

Also known as: iPlato Patient Care Messaging will be used to send the text message reminder to the patient.

Text Message Reminder Arm

Eligibility Criteria

• Age: 47 Years - 53 Years
• Sex: female
• Healthy Volunteers: Yes
• Age Groups: Adult (18-64)

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust: lead

Study Sites (1)

Charing Cross Hospital

Hammersmith, London, W6 8RF, United Kingdom

Location

Results Point of Contact

• Title: Dr Robert Kerrison, Senior Research Fellow
• Organization: UCL

Robert.kerrison.13@ucl.ac.uk

02076798268

Study Officials

• Ellis Friedman, FFPH

  London Borough of Sutton

  STUDY CHAIR

• Heema Shukla, PhD

  Public Health England

  STUDY CHAIR

• Deborah Cunningham, MBBS

  Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust

  STUDY CHAIR

• Robert S Kerrison, BSc

  Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust

  PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR

Publication Agreements

• PI is Sponsor Employee: No
• Restrictive Agreement: No

Study Design

• Study Type: interventional
• Phase: not applicable
• Allocation: RANDOMIZED
• Masking: SINGLE
• Who Masked: PARTICIPANT
• Purpose: HEALTH SERVICES RESEARCH
• Intervention Model: PARALLEL
• Sponsor Type: OTHER
• Responsible Party: SPONSOR

Study Record Dates

• First Submitted: October 9, 2013
• First Posted: November 6, 2013
• Study Start: November 1, 2012
• Primary Completion: November 1, 2013
• Study Completion: November 1, 2013
• Last Updated: April 6, 2021
• Results First Posted: April 6, 2021

Record last verified: 2021-03

Locations

GB (1)