Increasing Vision Center Service Utilization

Summary

Background: Vision Centre (primary eyecare facility): a major eye care service model catering to underserved rural areas. The sustainability of rural Vision Centres (VC) in north India is a major challenge due to the under-utilization of services by the local community and stakeholders. This affects self-sustainability and limits the expansion of services in rural areas. Dr. Shroff's Charity Eye Hospital is planning an intervention: door-to-door screening in VC's vicinity areas, to connect with the community.

In this operational research, the investigators plan to study if this intervention package, consisting of door-to-door screening and awareness generation in the service area can increase the utilization of VC services to a minimum of 14 out-patient cases per day within the study period and also analyze its cost-effectiveness for scalability.

Methodology: The study is a randomized experimental intervention, consisting of 2 VCs (intervention arm and control arm) selected from poor low-performing VCs i.e. walk-in out-patient cases≤ 10 per day, in two operational regions (Vrindavan, Mathura District, and Mohammadi, Kheri District) of Uttar Pradesh. Intervention includes door-to-door screening and awareness generation in 8-12 villages surrounding the VC. The control VC will follow existing practices of awareness generation through community activities and health talks. Data collected from each VC for the 4 months of intervention will include, a number of walk-in patients, spectacles advised, and their uptake, referral, and uptake for cataract and specialty surgery as well as operational expenses. Differences across arms in terms of the number of walk-in patients, referrals, uptake of services, and costs involved would be analyzed.

Conclusion: Through this study, the investigators would analyze if our intervention package is effective in increasing the VC service utilization and thus, overall sustainability. The investigators would also study the cost-effectiveness of this intervention, to assess its scalability.

Conditions

• Eye Diseases

Interventions

OTHER

Intervention Arm

Intervention includes door-to-door screening and awareness generation in 8-12 villages surrounding the Vision Centres

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Dr Shroff's Charity Eye Hospital

  collaborator UNKNOWN

• Indian Institute of Public Health, India

  collaborator OTHER

• Seva Canada Society

  collaborator OTHER

• Queen's University, Belfast

  collaborator OTHER

• Seva Foundation

  lead OTHER

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

HEALTH_SERVICES_RESEARCH

Masking

NONE

Model

PARALLEL

Eligibility

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2021-02-22

Primary Completion

2021-11-30

Completion

2021-12-30

Countries

• India

Study Locations