Shortening the Time to Bring Evidence into Practice: Dissemination of Research Findings Using On-Line Videos

Research findings that have global impact need to be disseminated fast worldwide. A systematic review of dissemination methods found a small number of studies whose study quality was poor and which did not provide strong evidence. On-line videos have become one of the major information sharing methods. In a cross-sectional study of on-line videos, emotional content appeared to be associated with high view counts. However, the confidence interval was broad and there was a chance of confounding. Therefore, I examined the effectiveness of emotional content in an on-line video on the extent to which the video was shared. Methods I conducted a two arm randomised controlled trial. I created two videos one of which was more emotional. Outcome was video sharing. Participants were researchers and health care professionals in midwifery, obstetrics and gynaecology. An independent statistician generated a random allocation sequence using a computer programme (1:1 allocation). I sent an invitation e-mail with a link to the video to participants and asked them to watch the video and share it if they found it helpful. The data were collected for 14 days after the e-mail was sent. The person who assessed the outcome and analysed data was masked to intervention allocation. Results 8353 participants, 4178 in the intervention group and 4175 in the control group, were included. 221 participants (5.3%) watched the intervention video and 215 participants (5.2%) watched the control video. Of those who were randomised to the intervention video, 44 (1.1%) participants shared it and 37 (0.9%) of the participants randomised to the control video shared it (RR 1.2 [95%CI 0.8 to 1.8], p=0.44). Conclusion The results were imprecise as the number of outcome events was low. The results, albeit imprecise, showed that there was no strong evidence for the effectiveness of emotional content on on-line video sharing.