International Journal of Epidemiology, Vol 26, 173-179, Copyright © 1997 by International Epidemiological Association
E Petridou, E Tolma, N Dessypris and D Trichopoulos
BACKGROUND: During the 20-month period September 1993 to April 1995, a
health education injury prevention programme focusing on home injuries
among the young (< or = 18 years old) and elderly (> or = 65 years
old) on the Greek island of Naxos was undertaken, its effectiveness was
evaluated by comparing the subsequent injury experience in sentinel
population groups in Naxos as well as in Spetses, another island of similar
sociodemographic profile, where no such intervention programme had been
formally implemented. METHODS: On the island-of Naxos an injury prevention
campaign was initially undertaken involving virtually all opinion leaders
and implemented through lectures, workshops and publicity in the local
media. The main intervention focused on 172 households on the island of
Naxos and was done by trained local collaborators who visited each
household weekly to provide injury prevention advice and assess home
safety. Similar visits were done by untrained collaborators in 177
households on the island of Spetses in order to assure collaboration of
household members in the comparative evaluation stage of the programme. The
process evaluation was based on ascertained changes of safety features and
attitudes in the participating households, whereas the outcome evaluation
was based on the incidence of injuries among members of the participating
households in the two islands over a period of 8.5 months (255 days).
RESULTS: On the intervention island of Naxos there were statistically
significant improvements with respect to 11 of the 28 examined variables,
whereas on the island of Spetses, such improvement was only noted for one
variable. The age-adjusted incidence rate ratio of injuries overall among
the target groups, contrasting the intervention and the control households
was 0.85 with 90% confidence interval (CI): 0.69-1.05. With respect to home
accidents the corresponding ratio was 0.79 with 90% CI: 0.60-1.04.
CONCLUSIONS: An intensive and focused injury prevention intervention had
only modest success when injuries themselves were the outcome variable.
ARTICLES
A controlled evaluation of a community injury prevention project in two Greek islands
Department of Hygiene and Epidemiology, Athens University Medical School, Greece.
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