Primary Care and Adolescent Immunization for Rochester
Condition: Adolescent Immunizations; Preventive Care
Study type: Interventional

Summary: 
      This study will examine whether the implementation of an outreach program that employs a
      tracking/reminder/recall/home visiting strategy will have any impact on receipt of
      immunizations and preventive care among urban adolescents.
    

Detailed description: 
      Outreach workers will be placed at 9 primary care pediatric and family medicine practices
      throughout one urban area. Adolescent patients at these 9 practices will be identified and
      then randomized into two groups; (1) those receiving outreach intervention during Year 1 of
      the study and (2) those receiving outreach intervention during Year 2 of the study.
      Randomization will be stratified by practice site, patient age, and patient gender.

      After randomization, the list of Year 1 subjects will be distributed to the appropriate
      outreach worker. The outreach worker will track the immunization status of 11-15yo patients
      within their practice, identify patients who are eligible for but have not yet received
      immunizations recommended for their age group (MMR, Varicella, Hepatitis B, HPV,
      Meningococcal Conjugate, Tdap) and/or a well child visit within the past year, and then
      attempt to connect these patients with medical care through three levels of outreach
      activity. First level of outreach activity involves contacting the parent/guardian of the
      patient by telephone. Outreach workers will attempt to inform patient's parent/guardian of
      needed immunizations/preventive visit and facilitate the scheduling of a medical appointment.
      If unable to successfully complete the task through telephone contact, outreach workers will
      initiate the second level of outreach activity - contact by mail. If contact by mail is
      unsuccessful, the third and most intense level of outreach activity will be implemented. The
      outreach worker will attempt to notify the patient's parent/guardian of need for
      immunization/preventive appointment by visiting the patient's listed home address. During
      this visit, the outreach worker will attempt to inform the parent/guardian of recommended
      immunizations, provide information pertaining to these immunizations, facilitate appointment
      scheduling, and assist patient in compliance with scheduled medical appointment

      Interventions directed towards the subjects of the Year 1 group will cease after 15 months of
      outreach activity. A chart review of intervention and control groups will be conducted to
      determine immunization and well child visit rates within the two groups. At this time, the
      tracking/reminder/recall/home visiting strategy employed with the Year 1 group will be
      repeated for Year 2 subjects.
    

Intervention name(s): outreach services
Intervention type(s): Other
Intervention description(s): Tracking/reminder/recall/home visit strategy.
Allocation: Randomized
Intervention model: Parallel Assignment
Masking: None (Open Label)
Primary purpose: Health Services Research