Stopping people losing their sight unnecessarily is a key priority for RNIB. The development of seamless eye care pathways and an evidence base about what works in relation to sight loss prevention lies at the centre of this priority.
To this end, RNIB has developed five Community Engagement Projects (CEPs) across England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. Each CEP is piloting a range of evidence-based eye health interventions to understand how effective they are at increasing service uptake and treatment concordance.
Establishing an evidence base
RNIB commissioned several pieces of research to inform the development of interventions to be piloted in the CEPs:
Equity profiles
Local public health specialists conducted a systematic review of data in the five CEP sites to explore the population characteristics, service provision, patterns of use and outcomes among the target populations. You can acess the individual equity profiles via the five location sites listed below.
Evidence review
De Montfort University conducted a review examining evidence of the effectiveness of intervention strategies to address inequalities in eye health care, relating particularly to age-related macular degeneration (AMD), cataracts, diabetic retinopathy and glaucoma. Read the evidence review.
Qualitative research
Conducted with commissioners, frontline eye health professionals, local communities and service users in the five CEP sites to explore awareness, experiences and views on accessing primary and secondary eye care services. Read the research into the barriers and enablers that affect access to primary and secondary eye care services.
Watch our video
Watch our short video that introduces the key findings of the qualitative research.
Working with professionals and service users
The CEP interventions are being hosted in conjunction with local Primary Care Trusts (PCTs) and Health Boards in five different sites across the UK and have been developed in collaboration with commissioners, frontline health professionals, local communities and service users.
Focusing on at-risk communities
Although sight loss can affect anyone at any time, several groups are at an increased risk of losing their sight unnecessarily. South Asian communities have an increased risk of diabetes and consequently diabetic eye conditions, including diabetic retinopathy, and African and African-Caribbean groups have an increased risk of developing glaucoma (1).
In addition, people living in socio-economic deprivation are less likely to access primary eye care services and are therefore at a greater risk of avoidable sight loss (6). To ensure the pilot interventions make a difference where it is most needed, RNIB's CEPs are focused on these at-risk groups.
RNIB's five CEPs are in:
The sites are distributed across the UK to ensure the pilot interventions acknowledge the different political, health and regulatory structures that exist across England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales.
Evaluation
Now that the interventions in the five CEP sites have been designed they will be piloted for 18-20 months between 2012 and 2014.
RNIB has appointed the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine to evaluate the effectiveness of the interventions across the five CEP sites. This will include:
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Outcome evaluation - to examine the impact of the interventions in changing people's knowledge and behaviour with regard to accessing eye care services.
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Process evaluation - to examine if the interventions reached the target population as planned, if they are acceptable and whether they were implemented as planned.
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Economic evaluation - to examine the cost-consequence of the interventions implemented at each site.