Behavioural science messages in Breast Cancer Screening
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Investigating the use of behavioural science informed messages to facilitate attendance at Breast Cancer Screening
IRAS ID
311717
Contact name
Ara Darzi
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Imperial College London
Clinicaltrials.gov Identifier
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 6 months, 1 days
Research summary
Breast cancer is the most common cancer in the UK. The NHS Breast Screening Programme invites women aged 50 to 70 every three years to a mammogram. By detecting cancer at an early stage, it is estimated screening saves 1300 lives a year. Despite this, attendance at screening has fallen nationally by 1.3% between 2016 to 2020.
Currently screening services use SMS reminders to facilitate attendance. Although research has shown reminders can increase screening uptake by 5%, the screening coverage rate in regions such as London is still the below recommended level of 70%. Behavioural science is a field that looks at understanding why people act in particular ways. It has already been successfully applied to improve health behaviors such as handwashing and health eating.
Recent studies have shown that behavioural science can be applied to breast screening messages to facilitate uptake of invitations. However, the use of plain text messages limits which barriers to screening can be addressed, and what techniques can be used. Video messaging provides a delivery mechanism that may enable more complex, and different combinations to be employed. There is, however, a lack of data regarding the impact of sending a video-based behavioural science message upon attendance rates at breast cancer screening programmes.
This study looks to investigate the impact of a video based on behavioural science, compared to behavioural science-based SMS message and the standard reminder SMS sent by the breast screening programme.
REC name
London - Surrey Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
22/LO/0325
Date of REC Opinion
6 Jun 2022
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion