Funding for this research was provided by:
Medical Research Council (MR/K501396/1)
Article History
Received: 1 April 2019
Accepted: 7 November 2019
First Online: 21 November 2019
Ethics approval and consent to participate
: Favourable ethical approval for the secondary analysis of this anonymised dataset was received on the 7th April 2014 from the Proportionate Review Sub-committee of the NHS Health Research Authority National Research Ethics Service (NRES) Committee North West, Preston (REC 14/NW/0249). As this was a retrospective study of routine anonymised medical records, participant informed consent was waived. Approvals were granted by the Research and Development (R&D) departments for all NHS Trusts to provide the routine anonymised data in the generation of the original dataset that was used in this secondary analysis.
: Not applicable.
: Nicola Heslehurst is a member of the editorial board (Associate Editor). The other authors declare that they have no competing interests.