Table 2 Intervention studies undertaken within the second national program on socioeconomic inequalities in health

Interventions targeting socioeconomic disadvantage

• Supplementary benefits to parents living in poverty, identified during preventive health screening of children (no evidence on effectiveness collected)

Interventions targeting health-related selection

• Counselling of secondary school children with frequent school absence due to illness (evaluation design failed)

Interventions targeting factors mediating the effect of socioeconomic disadvantage on health

• Tailored mass media campaign to promote periconceptional folic acid use (intervention did not reduce socioeconomic gap in folic acid use)

• Community-based intervention to improve health-related behavior in deprived neighborhoods (evaluation results will become available in 2002)

• Integrated program (including social skills teaching and monetary rewards) to prevent school children in lower general and vocational education to start smoking (intervention reduced smoking initiation rate)

• Teeth brushing at primary schools (intervention eliminated socioeconomic gap in teeth brushing)

• Adapted working methods (raised brick-laying) and equipment (lifting machine) for brick-layers (intervention reduced physical workload and sickness absenteeism)

• Rotation of tasks (driving and minicontainer loading) among dustmen (intervention reduced physical workload and sickness absenteeism)

• Introduction of self-organising teams in various production organisations (evaluation design failed)

Interventions targeting accessibility and quality of health care services

• Formation of local care networks among general practitioners, housing corporation staff and police officers to prevent homelessness among chronic psychiatric patients (intervention reduced house evictions and forced admissions to psychiatric hospitals)

• Peer education to diabetic patients of Turkish origin (intervention improved glycaemic control and healthy behaviour, but only in women)

• Introduction of nurse practitioners for asthma/COPD patients to general practice in deprived areas (intervention increased treatment compliance and reduced exacerbations)