Accepted for/Published in: JMIR Research Protocols
Date Submitted: Nov 20, 2018
Open Peer Review Period: Dec 3, 2018 - Dec 17, 2018
Date Accepted: Apr 2, 2019
(closed for review but you can still tweet)
To evaluate the impact of sending personalized messages through mobile phone SMS or automated calls in improving vaccine coverage among children in Pakistan: Protocol for a Community-based Cluster Randomized Clinical Trial
ABSTRACT
Background:
A major reason for poor childhood vaccine coverage in developing countries is the lack of awareness among parents and caregivers regarding the need for immunization, and the importance of completing the entire series of vaccines. SMS-based interventions have been quite effective in different programs, such as smoking cessation, treatment adherence, health care scheduled appointment attendance, antenatal care attendance and compliance to immunization. However, there is limited data from low middle income counteries (LMIC) on the role of SMS and automated call based messages and interventions to improve routine immunization (RI) coverage
Objective:
The primary objective of this study is to evaluate whether automated mobile phone based personalized messages (SMS or automated call) can improve RI uptake at 6, 10 and 14 weeks of age as per expanded program immunization schedule, compared to usual care control group. Secondary objectives include assessing the effects of different types of automated SMS text or calls on (RI) coverage at 20 weeks of age.
Methods:
This is a mixed method study using a clustered randomized control trial with four intervention arms and one control arm, augmented by qualitative interviews for personalizing the message. The intervention targets families to receive one way or two way (interactive) personalized automated SMS or automated phone call messages regarding vaccination, versus control. Possible barriers to vaccination are assessed in each family at the time of inclusion, to determine the type of personalized messages that should be sent to the family to increase the chance of a positive response. Finally, in-depth interviews using purposive sampling are conducted before and after the trial to determine the vaccine’s family experience and related factors.
Results:
N/A
Conclusions:
The results of this study will be useful to understand the respective effects of SMS text messages vs automated phone based communication to improve RI coverage and timelines. Moreover, information regarding families’ perceptions of vaccination and the daily life challenges for timely visits to the vaccine clinic will be used for developing more complex interventions that use mobile phone messages and possibly other approaches to overcome barriers in the uptake of correct and timely immunization practices. Clinical Trial: gov –NCT01908946
Citation
Per the author's request the PDF is not available.
Copyright
© The authors. All rights reserved. This is a privileged document currently under peer-review/community review (or an accepted/rejected manuscript). Authors have provided JMIR Publications with an exclusive license to publish this preprint on it's website for review and ahead-of-print citation purposes only. While the final peer-reviewed paper may be licensed under a cc-by license on publication, at this stage authors and publisher expressively prohibit redistribution of this draft paper other than for review purposes.