Increasing Donor Designation Rates in Teenagers: Effectiveness of a Driver's Education Intervention

Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center611 enrolled

Overview

Four aims were pursued: (1) Evaluate the effectiveness of video messaging on adolescent donor designations in comparison to a regionally-matched historical comparison group of adolescents; (2) Compare the differential effectiveness of three commonly-used donation messaging strategies (informational, testimonial, and blended) on donor designations; (3) Examine the impact of donation messaging on changes in secondary outcomes (donation engagement, knowledge, attitudes, beliefs, likelihood of donor designation, discussion with a parent) before and after video intervention; and (4) Assess the commitment of parents to follow their adolescent's donation wishes in the event of death. Our central hypotheses were that integrating donation video messaging into driver education classes would generate a higher proportion of donor designations compared to a historical comparison group and that blended video messaging (informational + testimonials) would yield a higher proportion of donor designations and more change in secondary outcomes.

Study Type

INTERVENTIONAL

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

HEALTH_SERVICES_RESEARCH

Masking

NONE

Enrollment

611

Conditions

Organ Donor Registration Organ Donation Education

Organ Donation Education: Testimonial MessagingBEHAVIORAL

The testimonial messaging video intervention will be shown

Organ Donation Education: Informational MessagingBEHAVIORAL

The informational messaging video intervention will be shown

Organ Donation Education: Blended MessagingBEHAVIORAL

The blended messaging video intervention will be shown

Eligibility

Sex: ALLHealthy volunteers:

Medical Language ↔ Plain English

Criteria for Classrooms: Classroom eligibility criteria included: (a) driver education conducted in English, and (b) instructor agreement not to provide or discuss donation information beyond the study video. Criteria for Adolescent Participants: Inclusion Criteria: * Enrolled in driving school class * English speaking * Adolescent assent * Parental permission to participate Exclusion Criteria: * Prior participation in a driver's education class in which organ donation education was provided * Parent permission form not signed

Outcomes

Primary Outcomes

Organ Donation Registration

The primary outcome was donor designation (yes-no) at time of obtaining first driver's license post-intervention. We provided the name, date of birth, last four digits of social security number, residential address, and study identification number of each adolescent to the Massachusetts DoT, which then returned to us a data file containing the donor designation status for each study identification number. For the regionally-matched historical comparison group, the DoT provided a de-identified data file of all adolescents who obtained their first driver's license in the six months prior to study enrollment at six motor vehicle offices.

Time frame: 6 months

Secondary Outcomes

Organ Donation Knowledge and Attitudes

Immediately before, shortly after, and 1 week following video messaging exposure, adolescents completed a questionnaire to assess the following donation constructs: engagement (2 questions -- 1-10 scale), knowledge (3 questions -- correct/incorrect total score range 0-3), general attitude (1 question), beliefs (4 questions -- strong disagree-strongly agree scale), designation likelihood (1 question -- 1-10 scale), and willingness to communicate donation decision to a parent (1 question -- 1-10 scale). Adolescents received a $5 gift card for each survey completed.

Time frame: 1 week

Parental Commitment

One week following the adolescent's exposure to the donation video, we mailed parents a brief questionnaire that included questions about their donor designation status (Yes/No), general donation attitude (1 question -- 1-10 scale), any communication with their adolescent about his/her donor designation intention (Yes/No), and likelihood of following their adolescent's wishes about donation (1 question -- 1-10 scale).