Coghill, Nikki

English

A Quantitative Service Evaluation of a Telephone Outreach Initiative to Enhance theUptake of NHS Health ChecksNikki Coghill, University of BathProblemThe NHS Health Check programme aims to identify cardiovascular (CV) risk in those aged 40-74, withthe goal of reducing cardiovascular events and health inequalities.CV incident is higher in lowersocioeconomic and ethnic minority groups. Invitations for a Checks are usually made via letter.However, research has indicated that telephone and verbal invitations increase likelihood ofattendance. To address this and encourage the above groups to better engage with NHS HealthChecks we adopted a novel approach compared to the usual invite. Our aim was to determine theefficacy of a targeted telephone outreach service for inviting patient from ‘hard to reach groups for anNHS health Check, in general practices located in the most deprived areas of Bristol.ApproachUsing a quasi-experimental approach, 12 general-practices self-selected to use the telephoneoutreach initiative (intervention). Specially trained, community-link workers contacted patients, andconducted aspects of the Check by phone. Following this, patient’s were invited to completeremaining aspects of their Check at their general-practice. Five practices acted as a control, using aletter, opportunistic or telephone call invitations; with no aspect of the Check being conducted duringthe telephone call. Primary outcome: Compare the rate of uptake of an NHS Health Check in thetarget population, in GP practices using the telephone outreach initiative, with the rate of uptake incontrol Secondary outcomes: Investigate the relationship between attendance and patientdemographics (age, gender, IMD and ethnicity) in the target population. Descriptive statisticscharacterised populations and binary logistical regression tested associations between attendance fora health check and population characteristics.FindingsUptake was 24% and 35% in intervention versus control practices. Missing data precluded inclusionof ethnicity in regression models. Intervention practices were more successful at attracting ethnicminority patients to complete their Check (25.6%) compared to control practices (7.2%). Inintervention practices after controlling for age, gender, IMD quintile and telephone-call outcome, agewasn’t a significant predictor of attendance; compared to women, men were significantly less likely tocomplete their Check (OR 0.75 95% CI 0.58 to 0.98); IMD was a significant predicator of attendancewith those in the fifth IMD quintile being less likely to attend compared to those in the first IMD quintile(OR 0.64 95% CI 0.50 to 0.82).ConsequencesDespite this initiative being offered by the most deprived practices in Bristol, it attracted the leastdeprived patients. However, intervention practises were more successful at attracting patients fromethnic minorities. We only evaluated the first nine months of the initiative. Previous novel initiativesencouraging uptake of Health Checks, in Bristol, have shown a lagged adoption. Feedback onimprovements, based on recommendations from this evaluation, may result in enhanced uptake fromthe intervention as it further embeds within practice

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A quantitative service evaluation of a telephone outreach initiative to enhance the uptake of NHS Health Checks

https://purehost.bath.ac.uk/ws/files/206117015/2020_sw_sapc_abstract_book.pdf

A quantitative service evaluation of a telephone outreach initiative to enhance the uptake of NHS Health Checks

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