Cost-effectiveness of support for health professionals to implement physical activity promotion: A protocol for within-trial and modelled economic evaluations of the PROMOTE-PA effectiveness-implementation hybrid trial

Abstract

Introduction Physical activity has important benefits for the prevention and management of chronic diseases and healthy ageing. Health professionals have valuable opportunities to promote physical activity to a large group of people across the lifespan. Promotion of Physical Activity by Health Professionals is a hybrid type 1 effectiveness-implementation cluster randomised trial designed to evaluate the impact of physical activity promotion by health professionals (n=30 clusters) on physical activity participation in their patients (n=720). To inform the future implementation of this programme, we will be conducting a within-trial and modelled economic evaluation. Methods and analysis We will conduct a cost-effectiveness and cost-utility analysis from the perspective of the healthcare, aged care and disability funder. The time horizon will be 6 months for the within-trial analysis and 2 years for the modelled analysis. Data on intervention costs will be collected using trial records. Data on healthcare utilisation will be collected using data linkage. Incremental cost-effectiveness ratios (ICERs) will be reported for physical activity and quality-adjusted life years outcomes. Bootstrapping will be used to explore uncertainty around the ICERs and estimate 95% CIs. Results will be presented on a cost-effectiveness plane. The probability that the intervention would be cost-effective at varying willingness-to-pay thresholds will be presented using a cost-effectiveness acceptability curve. Ethics and dissemination Ethics approval was obtained through Sydney Local Health District (RPAH zone) Ethics Review Committee (X23-0197). The findings of this study will be disseminated through peer-reviewed journal articles and conference presentations. Trial registration number Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry: ACTRN12623000920695.