Infection Control Behavior at Home During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Observational Study of a Web-Based Behavioral Intervention (Germ Defence).

BACKGROUND: To control the COVID-19 pandemic, people should adopt protective behaviors at home (self-isolation, social distancing, putting shopping and packages aside, wearing face coverings, cleaning and disinfecting, and handwashing). There is currently limited support to help individuals conduct these behaviors. OBJECTIVE: This study aims to report current household infection control behaviors in the United Kingdom and examine how they might be improved. METHODS: This was a pragmatic cross-sectional observational study of anonymous participant data from Germ Defence between May 6-24, 2020. Germ Defence is an open-access fully automated website providing behavioral advice for infection control within households. A total of 28,285 users sought advice from four website pathways based on household status (advice to protect themselves generally, to protect others if the user was showing symptoms, to protect themselves if household members were showing symptoms, and to protect a household member who is at high risk). Users reported current infection control behaviors within the home and intentions to change these behaviors. RESULTS: Current behaviors varied across all infection control measures but were between sometimes (face covering: mean 1.61, SD 1.19; social distancing: mean 2.40, SD 1.22; isolating: mean 2.78, SD 1.29; putting packages and shopping aside: mean 2.75, SD 1.55) and quite often (cleaning and disinfecting: mean 3.17, SD 1.18), except for handwashing (very often: mean 4.00, SD 1.03). Behaviors were similar regardless of the website pathway used. After using Germ Defence, users recorded intentions to improve infection control behavior across all website pathways and for all behaviors (overall average infection control score mean difference 0.30, 95% CI 0.29-0.31). CONCLUSIONS: Self-reported infection control behaviors other than handwashing are lower than is optimal for infection prevention, although handwashing is much higher. Advice using behavior change techniques in Germ Defence led to intentions to improve these behaviors. Promoting Germ Defence within national and local public health and primary care guidance could reduce COVID-19 transmission.

Infection control in the home: a qualitative study exploring perceptions and experiences of adhering to protective behaviours in the home during the COVID-19 pandemic.

OBJECTIVES: We sought to explore people's experiences and perceptions of implementing infection control behaviours in the home during the COVID-19 pandemic, guided by an online behavioural intervention. DESIGN: Inductive qualitative study. SETTING: UK public during the COVID-19 pandemic. PARTICIPANTS: Thirteen people took part in telephone interviews, and 124 completed a qualitative open-text survey. All were recruited from the public. Most survey participants were aged over 60 years, while interview participants were more distributed in age. Most reported being at increased risk from COVID-19, and were white British. INTERVENTION: Online behavioural intervention to support infection control behaviours in the home during the COVID-19 pandemic. DATA COLLECTION: Telephone think-aloud interviews and qualitative survey data. DATA ANALYSIS: The think-aloud interview data and qualitative survey data were analysed independently using inductive thematic analysis. The findings were subsequently triangulated. RESULTS: Thematic analysis of the telephone interviews generated seven themes: perceived risk; belief in the effectiveness of protective behaviours; acceptability of distancing and isolation; having capacity to perform the behaviours; habit forming reduces effort; having the confidence to perform the behaviours; and social norms affect motivation to engage in the behaviours. The themes identified from the survey data mapped well onto the interview analysis. Isolating and social distancing at home were less acceptable than cleaning and handwashing, influenced by the need for intimacy with household members. This was especially true in the absence of symptoms and when perceived risk was low. People felt more empowered when they understood that even small changes, such as spending some time apart, were worthwhile to reduce exposure and lessen viral load. CONCLUSIONS: The current study provided valuable insight into the acceptability and feasibility of protective behaviours, and how public health guidance could be incorporated into a behaviour change intervention for the public during a pandemic.

Adapting Behavioral Interventions for a Changing Public Health Context: A Worked Example of Implementing a Digital Intervention During a Global Pandemic Using Rapid Optimisation Methods.

Background: A rigorous approach is needed to inform rapid adaptation and optimisation of behavioral interventions in evolving public health contexts, such as the Covid-19 pandemic. This helps ensure that interventions are relevant, persuasive, and feasible while remaining evidence-based. This paper provides a set of iterative methods to rapidly adapt and optimize an intervention during implementation. These methods are demonstrated through the example of optimizing an effective online handwashing intervention called Germ Defense. Methods: Three revised versions of the intervention were rapidly optimized and launched within short timeframes of 1-2 months. Optimisations were informed by: regular stakeholder engagement; emerging scientific evidence, and changing government guidance; rapid qualitative research (telephone think-aloud interviews and open-text surveys), and analyses of usage data. All feedback was rapidly collated, using the Table of Changes method from the Person-Based Approach to prioritize potential optimisations in terms of their likely impact on behavior change. Written feedback from stakeholders on each new iteration of the intervention also informed specific optimisations of the content. Results: Working closely with clinical stakeholders ensured that the intervention was clinically accurate, for example, confirming that information about transmission and exposure was consistent with evidence. Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) contributors identified important clarifications to intervention content, such as whether Covid-19 can be transmitted via air as well as surfaces, and ensured that information about difficult behaviors (such as self-isolation) was supportive and feasible. Iterative updates were made in line with emerging evidence, including changes to the information about face-coverings and opening windows. Qualitative research provided insights into barriers to engaging with the intervention and target behaviors, with open-text surveys providing a useful supplement to detailed think-aloud interviews. Usage data helped identify common points of disengagement, which guided decisions about optimisations. The Table of Changes was modified to facilitate rapid collation and prioritization of multiple sources of feedback to inform optimisations. Engagement with PPI informed the optimisation process. Conclusions: Rapid optimisation methods of this kind may in future be used to help improve the speed and efficiency of adaptation, optimization, and implementation of interventions, in line with calls for more rapid, pragmatic health research methods.

Primary Care implementation of Germ Defence, a digital behaviour change intervention to improve household infection control during the COVID-19 pandemic: A structured summary of a study protocol for a randomised controlled trial.

OBJECTIVES: To examine the effectiveness of randomising dissemination of the Germ Defence behaviour change website via GP practices across England UK. TRIAL DESIGN: A two-arm (1:1 ratio) cluster randomised controlled trial implementing Germ Defence via GP practices compared with usual care. PARTICIPANTS: Setting: All Primary care GP practices in England. PARTICIPANTS: All patients aged 16 years and over who were granted access by participating GP practices. INTERVENTION AND COMPARATOR: Intervention: We will ask staff at GP practices randomised to the intervention arm to share the weblink to Germ Defence with all adult patients registered at their practice during the 4-month trial implementation period and care will otherwise follow current standard management. Germ Defence is an interactive website ( http://GermDefence.org/ ) employing behaviour change techniques and practical advice on how to reduce the spread of infection in the home. The coronavirus version of Germ Defence helps people understand what measures to take and when to take them to avoid infection. This includes hand washing, avoiding sharing rooms and surfaces, dealing with deliveries and ventilating rooms. Using behaviour change techniques, it helps users think through and adopt better home hygiene habits and find ways to solve any barriers, providing personalised goal setting and tailored advice that fits users' personal circumstances and problem solving to overcome barriers. Comparator: Patients at GP practices randomised to the usual care arm will receive current standard management for the 4-month trial period after which we will ask staff to share the link to Germ Defence with all adult patients registered at their practice. MAIN OUTCOMES: The primary outcome is the effects of implementing Germ Defence on prevalence of all respiratory tract infection diagnoses during the 4-month trial implementation period. The secondary outcomes are: 1) incidence of COVID-19 diagnoses 2) incidence of COVID-19 symptom presentation 3) incidence of gastrointestinal infections 4) number of primary care consultations 5) antibiotic usage 6) hospital admissions 7) uptake of GP practices disseminating Germ Defence to their patients 8) usage of the Germ Defence website by individuals who were granted access by their GP practice RANDOMISATION: GP practices will be randomised on a 1:1 basis by the independent Bristol Randomised Trials Collaboration (BRTC). Clinical Commission Groups (CCGs) in England will be divided into blocks according to region, and equal numbers in each block will be randomly allocated to intervention or usual care. The randomisation schedule will be generated in Stata statistical software by a statistician not otherwise involved in the enrolment of general practices into the study. BLINDING (MASKING): The principal investigators, the statistician and study collaborators will remain blinded from the identity of randomised practices until the end of the study. NUMBERS TO BE RANDOMISED (SAMPLE SIZE): To detect planned effect size (based on PRIMIT trial, Little et al, 2015): 11.1 million respondents from 6822 active GP practices. Assuming 25% of these GP practices will engage, we will contact all GP practices in England spread across 135 Clinical Commissioning Groups. TRIAL STATUS: Protocol version 2.0, dated 13 January 2021. Implementation is ongoing. The implementation period started on 10 November 2020 and will end on 10 March 2021. TRIAL REGISTRATION: This trial was registered in the ISRCTN registry ( isrctn.com/ ISRCTN14602359 ) on 12 August 2020. FULL PROTOCOL: The full protocol is attached as an additional file, accessible from the Trials website (Additional file 1). In the interest in expediting dissemination of this material, the familiar formatting has been eliminated; this Letter serves as a summary of the key elements of the full protocol.