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Table 1 Clinical Trials Unit survey on recruitment and retention - routinely used methods (with or without formal evaluation)
| Category | Examples (recruitment) | Examples (retention) |
|---|---|---|
| Patient contact | Patient information (appropriate design and translation) | Additional contacts (reminders, newsletters, feedback for patients, and websites) |
| Promotion (newsletters, advertisements, presentations, events, press release, and community sessions) | ||
| Patient convenience | Flexible appointments | |
| Reducing research burden (shortened assessment scales and online data collection) | ||
| Support for recruiters | Presentations and training about recruitment issues to recruiting staff | Presentations and training about retention issues to recruiting staff |
| Monitoring and systems | Recruitment staff reminders (computer pop ups) | Tracking patients (flagging, contacts for change of address, and collection of multiple contacts) |
| Use of existing registers (mail shots and screening notes) | Reminders (calendars, alert cards, and ongoing contacts with control or wait list participants) | |
| Reducing burden (randomizing online in real-time, phone number for queries, and simple case report forms) | ||
| Incentives | Targets (site recruitment targets, feedback, and competition among sites) | Incentives (gifts for sites, co-authorship for good retention, and monetary incentives) |
| Incentives (gifts for sites, co-authorship for good recruiters, and monetary incentives) | ||
| Design | Relevance of study design | Options other than complete withdrawal |
| Piloting | Patient and public involvement | |
| Changing protocol (widening criteria) | ||
| Patient and public involvement | ||
| Resources | Site resources | |
| Additional resources (such as networks) | ||
| Human factors | Relationships (face-to-face initiation visit, regular contact with recruitment staff, site champions, and ongoing relationships between trials) | Relationship (support for patient between visits, handwriting envelopes, Christmas/birthday cards, and thanking participants) |
