Comparing recruitment strategies for a digital smoking cessation intervention: Technology-assisted peer recruitment, social media, ResearchMatch, and smokefree.gov
Section snippets
Background
Recruitment of participants to randomized trials is an ongoing challenge. Only about 40% of trials are successful in recruiting their proposed sample [1] and many struggle to recruit diverse populations [2]. Despite the promise of increased reach, this is also true for recruitment to trials evaluating digital interventions, such as web-assisted tobacco interventions [3]. There is now increasing recognition that we need more data on different recruitment strategies [4]. Choosing the right
Study design, setting, and participants
The present report is a cohort study of people who smoke who enrolled into a large 6-month hybrid effectiveness dissemination trial (Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute funded award (CDR-1603-34,645) testing a web-assisted tobacco digital intervention (Smoker-to-Smoker, or S2S). Eligible participants were asked to participate in a 6-month trial in which they would receive tailored motivational messages related to smoking cessation via email or text, have access to functions on the
Recruitment overview
We recruited 1487 participants using 5 recruitment approaches. The sample consisted of 18% (273/1478) of participants recruited through peer recruitment, 34% (505/1478) via Facebook, 24% (356/1478) via ResearchMatch, 14% (200/1478) via Google ads, and 10% (153/1478) via Smokefree.gov. The mean enrollment rate per active recruitment month by strategy is as follows: 1) Research Match, n = 59.3, 2) Facebook ads, n = 25.3, 3) peer recruitment, n = 13.9, 4) Smokefree.gov, n = 13.9, and 5) Google
Discussion
Recruitment into research trials, including digital trials, continues to present challenges for researchers. We compared a novel peer recruitment approach with other recruitment strategies that are more widely used [4]. Peer recruitment accounted for 18% of enrolled participants and increased the variability and diversity of the sample. Peer recruitment was modestly cost-effective, but also increased the number of participants with lower education levels, greater number of connections to others
Conclusion
Although peer recruitment had a modest enrollment rate (13.9) in comparison to Facebook (25.3) and ResearchMatch (59.3), this should be evaluated in terms of the other potential benefits of peer recruitment. Our findings suggest that peer recruitment may provide greater access to harder to reach populations and possibly others who smoke within one's social network. It was also modestly cost-effective per retained participant in the trial. Using social media approaches may be prudent for
Funding
This work was supported through a Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) Program Award (CDR-1603-34645), NHLBI (1K12HL138049-01), and NCI PRACCTIS Grant (CA172009). The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of PCORI or the National Institutes of Health.
Declaration of Competing Interest
None.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank the S2S program staff, IT team as well as the patient panel members for their contributions to the project.
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