Targeted Letters to Reduce Avoidable Emergency Department Attendances

The Behavioural Insights Team

Status: Unknown

Conditions: Avoidable Emergency Department Attendances

Treatments: Behavioral: Letter

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT02334189

2014055

Details and patient eligibility

About

The study aims to test whether it is possible to reduce pressure on Emergency Departments by sending a personal feedback letter to people who have recently attended an Emergency Department and whose health issues could likely have been dealt with elsewhere. These attendances clearly have many causes. However, it is likely that some attendances are due to behavioural factors - in other words, the various ways in which users interact with services. This study focuses on one particular behavioural factor: lack of feedback to users making avoidable visits.

The study will take place in collaboration with an NHS hospital trust. Each week during the trial, the hospital trust will identify those Emergency Department attendances in the last seven days which, according to clinical judgement, could have been dealt with elsewhere. Patients will then be randomly selected to receive a letter containing information on alternative healthcare options for non-emergency health concerns. Patient records will be analysed to determine whether the patients who received the letter are less likely to make an avoidable repeat visit to the Emergency Department in the future, compared with patients who received no letter.

Enrollment: 25,000 estimated patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18+ years old

Volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Adults who attended a participating Emergency Department during the trial period and whose attendance was codes as 'No Investigation No Significant Treatment'

Exclusion criteria

• Children under the age of 18
• All departments and hospitals other than participating Emergency Departments.

Trial design

Primary purpose: Health Services Research

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: Double Blind

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25,000 participants in 2 patient groups

Letter

Experimental group

Description:

Patients receive a letter containing information on alternative healthcare options for non-emergency health concerns.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Letter

No letter

No Intervention group

Description:

Patients receive no letter (this is the usual care).