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What Drives Poor Care for Child Diarrhea: A Standardized Patient Experiment
Sponsor: RAND
Summary
Diarrhea is the second leading cause of death for children around the world, although nearly all of these deaths could be prevented with an inexpensive and simple treatment: oral rehydration salts (ORS). Many children with diarrhea do not receive ORS when they seek treatment and this study uses a field experiment to examine why this occurs. We will use anonymous standardized patients combined with a randomized ORS supply intervention to isolate the causal effect of several potential reasons for why children do not receive ORS when they seek care: 1) caretakers prefer ORS alternatives, 2) providers have a financial incentives to prescribe ORS alternatives, and 3) ORS is often out of stock.
Key Details
Gender
All
Age Range
18 Years - Any
Study Type
INTERVENTIONAL
Enrollment
2451
Start Date
2022-05-05
Completion Date
2025-06-01
Last Updated
2024-04-30
Healthy Volunteers
Yes
Conditions
Interventions
Free distribution of ORS
Provides will receive 3 months supply of ORS at the beginning of the study to dispense to their patients. They will be asked to dispense the ORS at the market rate and not to give it away to other providers.
Standardized patient with ORS preference
Providers will receive a visit from an anonymous standardize patient posing a caretaker for a child with diarrhea who requests ORS to treat their child's diarrhea.
Standardized patient with Antibiotic preference
Providers will receive a visit from an anonymous standardize patient posing a caretaker for a child with diarrhea who requests Antibiotics to treat their child's diarrhea.
Standardized patient with no preference
Providers will receive a visit from an anonymous standardize patient posing a caretaker for a child with diarrhea who does not request anything specific to treat their child's diarrhea.
Standardized patient with no preference + no financial incentive
Providers will receive a visit from an anonymous standardize patient posing a caretaker for a child with diarrhea who does not request anything specific to treat their child's diarrhea. In addition they will inform the provider that they are not going to purchase anything from the provider because they have an uncle with a drug shop where they can get a discount.
Locations (1)
Indian Institute of Management Bangalore
Bangalore, Karnataka, India