Protocol for Community-based Intervention for Blood Pressure Reduction in Nepal: a Community-based Cluster Randomized Controlled Trial

Hypertension contributes to significant burden of cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) in low and middle-income countries; however responses to CVDs are inadequate particularly due to lack of conclusive evidence on population based approach to hypertension control. This is a community based cluster randomized trial involving family based health education through female community health volunteers in Nepal. People ≥25 years of age and who are listed in the voter list 2006 of Electoral Commission of Nepal who were either hypertensive, pre-hypertensive or normotensive are eligible for eligible for participation in the study. A computer generated random codes will be used to divide clusters into treatment and control arm. FCHVs will conduct family based health education and blood pressure measurements in the treatment arm vs not any interventions in control arm. Independent assessors will conduct the baseline and end line assessment of the intervention. Intention to treat analysis and per protocol analysis will be used in analysis to detect significant differences between treatment and control group participants at baseline and follow up. Student t-tests for normally distributed variables and chi-squared tests for categorical variables will be used. In the event that randomization do not control for differences between the treatment and control groups on baseline characteristics, the investigators will statistically control for those differences in subsequent analysis of program effects. The final outcome will be modeled by using multiple linear regressions analysis. The investigators hope that if the intervention outcomes shows positive effects in treatment arm, this approach can be adopted into the existing health care delivery system in Nepal. Assessing the FCHVs' ability may further contribute to developing a policy that can be scaled-up to a national level. The lessons learned from this project may also be replicated in rural areas and similar settings elsewhere in the world.