Presenting Summary Information From Cochrane Systematic Reviews: Protocol for Research of Infographics Presentation vs. Plain Language Summary

The objective of this study is to evaluate the efficacy of infographics, compared to standard PLS format, in presenting information, in terms of understanding and remembering research results by consumers.

Study Overview

• Status: Completed
• Conditions: Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice
• Intervention / Treatment: Other: PLS; Other: Infographics

Detailed Description

The investigators will conduct a randomized controlled trial (RCT) with two different formats of the same systematic review summary (Infographics, PLS). The content of these two formats is based on the same systematic review, but the ways of data presentation will differ: visual presentation in plain language and plain language only. The interventions will be delivered online in November 2016, with members of the consumers' groups for pregnancy and parenting - RODA ("Roditelji u akciji", engl."Parents in action"), which gathers different types of consumers: pregnant women, young mothers and parenting and pregnancy advisors; and the members of the Association for Patients' Rights. The trial will be voluntary and anonymous. The survey will consist of 5 parts, in the following order: 1) one format of the summary (randomly assigned), 2) health numeracy, 3) demographic data 4) comprehension test of the information given in the summary, and 5) user friendliness of information and overall satisfaction with the given summary assessed by survey.

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Actual): 212
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• Croatia
  • Split, Croatia, 21000
    • University of Split

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: Child; Adult; Older Adult
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: Yes
• Genders Eligible for Study: Female

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• Eligible participants will be members of RODA and Association for Patients' Rights (women) .

Exclusion Criteria:

• Male members of RODA and Association for Patient's Rights

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Treatment
• Allocation: Randomized
• Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
• Masking: Double

Number of Arms

2

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
Active Comparator: PLS; The control group will receive PLS: text format with simple explanation of the survey topic main findings and is intended for lay audience.	Other: PLS; Text format with simple explanation of the survey topic main findings and is intended for lay audience.
Experimental: Infographics; Infographics format of a Cochrane systematic review summary represents the experimental intervention in the trial, where the results are presented with text and pictures.	Other: Infographics; Cochrane started developing infographics, where short textual information about research is supported by visual representations of the main findings and is also aimed at the lay public The investigators will examine whether this format is better in information uptake than standard PLS.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Understanding of the Summary Content	The questions will focus on understanding the benefits and risks of the intervention and the quality of evidence described in the systematic review. There will be 10 open ended questions, which will be assessed by two assessors, and the total score will be the sum of correct answers (total score ranging from 0-10). Higher scores would represent greater understanding of the content.	One month (30 days)

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Reading Experience	This section of the survey will include 5 questions about the experience of participants about the text they read, measured on a 10-point Likert type scale, where 1 means do not agree at all and 10 means fully agree. The total score is the sum of scores on all five answers (minimum 5, maximum 50). Greater scores indicate more positive reading experience.	One month (30 days)
User Friendliness	This section of the survey will have 5 questions concerning how easy it was for the participant to find relevant information, measured by a 10-point Likert type scale where the answer 1 means I do not agree at all and 10 means I fully agree. The total score is the sum of scores on all the answers (minimum 5, maximum 50). Higher scores indicate greater perception of the summary format as more user friendly.	One month (30 days)

Other Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Health Numeracy	This section will use 6-item General health numeracy test (Osborne et al., 2013) in order to determine how much our participants understand the basic health instructions regarding numeracy dimension. For each correct answer, the participants receive one point and the total score is the sum of all correct answers.	One month (30 days)

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: University Hospital of Split
• Collaborators: University of Liverpool
• Investigators: Principal Investigator: Ivan Buljan, Researcher

Publications and helpful links

General Publications

• Osborn CY, Wallston KA, Shpigel A, Cavanaugh K, Kripalani S, Rothman RL. Development and validation of the General Health Numeracy Test (GHNT). Patient Educ Couns. 2013 Jun;91(3):350-6. doi: 10.1016/j.pec.2013.01.001. Epub 2013 Feb 21.

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start: November 1, 2016
• Primary Completion (Actual): December 1, 2016
• Study Completion (Actual): December 1, 2016

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: November 25, 2016
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: December 1, 2016
• First Posted (Estimate): December 2, 2016

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): June 3, 2019
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: February 18, 2019
• Last Verified: February 1, 2019

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Other Study ID Numbers: IP-2014-11-7672

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: YES