Effect and cost-effectiveness of educating mothers about childhood DPT vaccination on immunisation uptake, knowledge, and perceptions in Uttar Pradesh, India: A randomised controlled trial

by Timothy Powell-Jackson, Camilla Fabbri, Varun Dutt, Sarah Tougher, Kultar Singh BackgroundTo assess the effect of health information on immunisation uptake in rural India, we conducted an individually randomised controlled trial of health information messages targeting the mothers of unvaccinated or incompletely vaccinated children through home visits in rural Uttar Pradesh, India. Methods and findingsThe study tested a brief intervention that provided mothers face-to-face with information on the benefits of the tetanus vaccine. Participants were 722 mothers of children aged 0 –36 months who had not received 3 doses of diphtheria–pertussis–tetanus (DPT) vaccine (DPT3). Mothers were randomly assigned in a ratio of 1:1:1 to 1 of 3 study arms: mothers in the first treatment group received information framed as a gain (e.g., the child is less likely to get tetanus and m ore likely to be healthy if vaccinated), mothers in the second treatment group received information framed in terms of a loss (e.g., the child is more likely to get tetanus and suffer ill health if not vaccinated), and the third arm acted as a control group, with no information given to the mother. Surveys were conducted at baseline (September 2015) and after the intervention (April 2016). The primary outcome was the proportion of children who had received DPT3 measured after 7 months of follow-up. The analysis was by intention to treat. A total of 16 (2.2%) participants were lost to follow-up . The cover...
Source: PLoS Medicine - Category: Internal Medicine Authors: Source Type: research