Implementing primary healthcare-based measurement, advice and treatment for heavy drinking and comorbid depression at the municipal level in three Latin American countries - final protocol for a quasiexperimental study (SCALA study)

- Uses a theory-based approach to tailor clinical materials and training programmes, creating city-based Community Advisory Boards, and user-based user panels to ensure that tailoring matches user needs, municipal services and coproduction of health.
-Tests the added value of embedding and implementing primary healthcare activity within municipal-based adoption mechanisms and support systems, and community-based communication campaigns.
- Has a longer time frame (18 months) than is traditionally used in implementation studies, to assess longer term impacts.
- Gives considerable emphasis to process evaluation, developing logic models to document the fidelity of all implementation strategies, and to identify, the drivers and barriers and facilitators to successful implementation and scale-up.
- Due to municipal-based political and technical considerations, we are unable to randomise the involved municipal areas. We adopt a quasiexperimental design, optimising comparator municipal areas for confounding, and by using propensity score matching.