Effect of a peer-led prevention program (P2P) on smoking in vocational high school students: Results from a two-school-year cluster-randomized trial
Abstract
AIMS
The aim of this work was to measure the impact of P2P (i.e. peer-to-peer), a peer-led smoking prevention intervention, on daily smoking prevalence of adolescents over 2 school years.
DESIGN
A cluster-randomized controlled trial was performed over a 16-month follow-up (trial status: closed to follow-up). P2P was implemented 1-3 and 13-15 months after baseline. Assessments took place at baseline and 4, 10 and 16 months after baseline. The research team, assessors and adolescents were blinded to the study-arm assignment only at baseline.
SETTING
Fifteen vocational high schools in France were randomized into two clusters, using a 1:1 allocation ratio per French department (n intervention = 7, n control = 8).
PARTICIPANTS
Participants comprised a sample of 2010 students in year 11 (i.e. 15-16 years) in vocational high schools. A total of 437 students could not be assessed at baseline (absent or left school), yielding a total sample of 1573 students (n intervention = 749, n control = 824).
INTERVENTION AND COMPARATOR
The P2P programme trained voluntary students to become peer educators and design smoking prevention actions for their schoolmates in the intervention group (n = 945 students), compared with a passive control group (n = 1065 students).
MEASUREMENTS
The primary outcome was change from baseline in the prevalence of self-reported daily smoking (i.e. at least one cigarette per day) at 16 months.
FINDINGS
The 'time × group' interaction indicated that, compared with the…
How strong is the evidence?
Evidence Hub reads this as a randomized trial, done in people. Its evidence level is 2 of 5 (High · randomized trial). Randomized trials of a reasonable size are the strongest single-study design. Reported size: 1,065 participants or records.
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