Theory Based SMS Reminders - Text's Impact on Patient Attendance

NCT ID: NCT02453633

Last Updated: 2015-05-25

Basic Information

• Recruitment Status: UNKNOWN
• Clinical Phase: NA
• Total Enrollment: 2000 participants
• Study Classification: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Start Date: 2015-05-31
• Study Completion Date: 2015-08-31

Brief Summary

The project will be done at the ear, nose and throat outpatient department at Lovisenberg Diakonale Hospital (LDS) in 2015-2016. About 12% of patients with appointments at the surgical outpatient clinic at LDS do not attend their appointment even after receiving both letters and shot message service (SMS) reminders. Persuasion theory suggests that the SMS reminders may be more effective if the text appeals more to the patient's feelings. The project is designed as a randomized controlled trial in which the control group receives the standard text that has neutral content and the intervention group receives a more emotion-based SMS reminder. The aim is to determine whether the more emotional text reduces the proportion of patients who do not show up for their scheduled appointment at the surgical outpatient clinic.

Detailed Description

Studies from Norway's Health South East (HSØ) show that the number of patients who do not attend their scheduled appointments account for 200 000 to 250 000 outpatient consultations each year. For comparison, there are 270,000 patients waiting for treatment. It has thus been recommended that regional health authorities take measures to reduce the number of patients who do not attend their scheduled appointment.

This study will evaluate whether short message service (SMS) appointment reminders that appeal to the patient's emotions are more effective for reducing non-attendance to scheduled outpatient appointments at the ear, nose, and throat outpatient clinic at Lovisenberg Diakonale Hospital in Oslo, Norway. The study will be designed as randomized controlled trial in which 2000 patients are randomly assigned to either the intervention group (emotional SMS text) or the control group (standard SMS text with neutral content). Because theory suggests that emotion-based text messages will be more effective reminders, it is hypothesized that they will result in a 50% reduction in the number of patients who do not show for their appointment compared to the control group.

Conditions

Otorhinolaryngologic Diseases; Sleep Disorders; Hearing Disorders

Study Design

• Allocation Method: RANDOMIZED
• Intervention Model: PARALLEL
• Primary Study Purpose: HEALTH_SERVICES_RESEARCH
• Blinding Strategy: TRIPLE

Study Groups

Emotional SMS text

Patients in this arm will receive an emotion-based SMS reminder of their scheduled outpatient clinic appointment.

Group Type: EXPERIMENTAL

Emotional SMS text

Intervention Type: OTHER

SMS appointment reminder with the following text (translated from Norwegian):

Reminder about your appointment. There are many who are waiting for treatment. Please notify us if you can not make your appointment on: Tuesday 31 March at 10:00.

tel. 23225501 or send email to kirpolonh@lds.no later than one weekday prior to your appointment.

No-show fee: Kr. 640.

Lovisenberg Diakonale Hospital, Department of Surgery, Ear, Nose and Throat. Do not reply to this message per SMS.

Standard SMS text

Patients in this arm will receive the standard SMS reminder of their scheduled outpatient clinic appointment.

Group Type: ACTIVE_COMPARATOR

Standard SMS text

Intervention Type: OTHER

SMS appointment reminder with the following text (translated from Norwegian):

Reminder of appointment at Lovisenberg Diakonale Hospital, Department of Surgery, Ear, Nose and Throat: Wednesday 11.feb 2015 at 10:00. For a change, call tel. 23225501 or send email to kirpolonh@lds.no. Do not reply to this message per SMS.

Interventions

Emotional SMS text

SMS appointment reminder with the following text (translated from Norwegian):

Reminder about your appointment. There are many who are waiting for treatment. Please notify us if you can not make your appointment on: Tuesday 31 March at 10:00.

tel. 23225501 or send email to kirpolonh@lds.no later than one weekday prior to your appointment.

No-show fee: Kr. 640.

Lovisenberg Diakonale Hospital, Department of Surgery, Ear, Nose and Throat. Do not reply to this message per SMS.

Intervention Type: OTHER

Standard SMS text

SMS appointment reminder with the following text (translated from Norwegian):

Reminder of appointment at Lovisenberg Diakonale Hospital, Department of Surgery, Ear, Nose and Throat: Wednesday 11.feb 2015 at 10:00. For a change, call tel. 23225501 or send email to kirpolonh@lds.no. Do not reply to this message per SMS.

Intervention Type: OTHER

Eligibility Criteria

Inclusion Criteria

• Patients (any diagnosis) with a scheduled clinic appointment at the LDS Ear, Nose and Throat Surgical Clinic or scheduled for polysomnography during the inclusion period.
• Date of birth on or after 01.01.1935

Exclusion Criteria

• Patients with 2 appointments on the same day, only the first appointment will be included.
• Patients without a phone number
• Patients born before 01.01.1935
• Included patients will not be included again if they get a new appointment in the inclusion period.

• Maximum Eligible Age: 80 Years
• Eligible Sex: ALL
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No

Sponsors

Lovisenberg Diakonale Hospital

OTHER

Sponsor Role: lead

Responsible Party

Responsibility Role: SPONSOR

Principal Investigators

Bjørn Holm, MD

Role: STUDY_DIRECTOR

Lovisenberg Diakonale Hospital

Anners Lerdal, RN, PhD

Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Lovisenberg Diakonale Hospital

Central Contacts

Trude von Trepka

Role: CONTACT

trvt@lds.no

+47 23226862

Grete Saetre

Role: CONTACT

gres@lds.no

+47 23225501

Other Identifiers

SMS-ENT

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id