Aims and methodTo determine whether members of the general public read a leaflet from the Time to Change anti-stigma campaign. The leaflets were sent to 1000 members of the public at random. Those who read the leaflet were asked, in a statement concealed within the text, to return it. A second study involved modified leaflets being posted to 400 members of a representative panel of the UK general public.ResultsOnly 20 of the 1000 (2%) people who received the unsolicited leaflet returned them, which suggests that the vast majority were unread. However, the leaflet achieved a good response in the sample from the research panel with at least 29% of participants (115 of 400) reading the leaflet.Clinical implicationsA very small proportion of people acknowledge unsolicited leaflets. However, the leaflet was read by almost a third of a research panel. Hence, few people are likely to read unsolicited leaflets, including those containing a public health message.
BMI and mortality: sorting through the data to find the public health message
