The GoActive intervention (www.goactive-uk.com) is a school-based physical activity promotion programme, designed for 13-14 year old adolescents. It is currently being evaluated in a large-scale cluster randomised controlled trial (CRCT) across Essex and Cambridgeshire, funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR).
The GoActive team have actively involved key stakeholders throughout the research project. Students, teachers, and lay members of the West Anglia Comprehensive Local Research Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) workshop worked extensively with researchers to design the GoActive intervention and develop participant resources. A Trial Steering Committee was appointed at the outset of the evaluation, including two lay members; a school teacher to provide insight into educational structure relevant to the GoActive evaluation, and a council member to help us understand the wider political and organisational climate for public health. A Deliberative Dialogue workshop was conducted, including parents and teachers, representatives from the public health registry, regional government, and relevant charity organisations. School recruitment, intervention delivery and content, and methods of involving key agencies (including dissemination of results) were all discussed. Individual meetings have also been held with numerous key stakeholders to ensure the evaluation of GoActive provides useful information to those working directly in adolescent health and education. For example, meeting with the Disability Co-ordinator for Living Sport was key to ensuring GoActive is inclusive for all Year 9 students, regardless of physical capacity, whilst meeting with the Ofsted National Lead for PE provided insight into how research studies can assist schools in meeting key performance targets.
We recruited an adolescent PPI group predominantly from the ACTIVE PPI group, based at Addenbrookes Hospital. This group have met on multiple occasions and have been instrumental in both the development and evaluation of the GoActive intervention. Students from this group developed scripts for, and starred in, 20 activity videos for use with intervention schools, and filmed an introductory video explaining the CRCT and demonstrating study measurements. This work received a nomination for the University of Cambridge Vice Chancellor’s Award for Public Engagement. Students also provided feedback on the ‘QuickCards’ (short information sheets) which are associated with each of the 20 intervention activities, and the intervention website upon which these and other resources are housed. Further, our PPI group reviewed intervention prizes, and participation incentives, to ensure they were appropriate for, and appealing to, adolescents.
The primary contact for GoActive is the Principal Investigator, Dr Kirsten Corder (klc29@medschl.cam.ac.uk)