Feasibility of a cluster randomised trial on the effect of trauma life support training: a pilot study in India.

OBJECTIVE

To assess the feasibility of conducting a cluster randomised controlled trial comparing the effects of Advanced Trauma Life Support (ATLS) and Primary Trauma Care (PTC) with standard care on patient outcomes.

DESIGN

This was a pilot pragmatic three-armed parallel, cluster randomised, controlled trial conducted between April 2022 and February 2023. Patients were followed up for 30 days.

SETTING

Tertiary care hospitals across metropolitan areas in India.

PARTICIPANTS

Adult trauma patients and residents managing these patients were included.

INTERVENTIONS: ATLS or PTC training was provided for residents in the intervention arms.

MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES: The outcomes were the consent rate, loss to follow-up rate, missing data rates, differences in the distribution between observed data and data extracted from medical records, and the resident pass rate.

RESULTS

Two hospitals were randomised to the ATLS arm, two to the PTC arm and three to the standard care arm. We included 376 patients and 22 residents. The percentage of patients who consented to follow-up was 77% and the percentage of residents who consented to receive training was 100%. The loss to follow-up rate was 14%. The pass rate was 100%. Overall, the amount of missing data for key variables was low. The data collected through observations were similar to data extracted from medical records, but there were more missing values in the extracted data.

CONCLUSIONS

Conducting a full-scale cluster randomised controlled trial comparing the effects of ATLS, PTC and standard care on patient outcomes appears feasible, especially if such a trial would use data and outcomes available in medical records.

TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER: NCT05417243.