Speaker
Megan L. Ranney, MD, MPH, FACEP
Director, Brown-Lifespan Center for Digital Health
Warren Alpert Endowed Associate Professor of Emergency Medicine, Brown University
Associate Dean of Strategy and Innovation, School of Public Health, Brown University
Chief Research Officer, AFFIRM
Co-founder, GetUsPPE
Topic
Online Recruitment in the Era of COVID-19: Pitfalls and Progress
Keywords
COVID-19; Online trial recruitment; Clinical trials; Emergency medicine; Digital health technologies; Remote interventions; Electronic informed consent
Key Points
- The Center for Digital Health at Brown University is a research and education hub that explores innovative solutions to urgent health challenges. The Center has supported studies involving the use of digital health technologies for recruiting participants and delivering behavioral health interventions.
- Due to disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, many research studies pivoted from in-person contact toward the use of digital technologies such as smartphone apps and remote telehealth.
- To advance clinical trials in a post-pandemic world, we will need to establish best practices for digital health technologies—and recognize when online recruitment is appropriate and when it is not. Hybrid recruitment models offer a solution.
Discussion Themes
It remains clear that the relationship between study staff and participants is essential to forming positive alliances and determines the likelihood of follow up.
For social media advertising, it’s possible that an IRB could approve a group of images, headlines, and content that study teams can combine in different ways to optimize the advertising over the course of a study.
The Pew Research Center provides recent data on which social media platforms are used most by Americans. Read more about digital health science at the Center for Digital Health.
Tags
#pctGR, @Collaboratory1