Child and Reproductive Health Group, Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, Pembroke place, Liverpool, L3 5QA, UK.
BMC Med Res Methodol. 2012 Apr 20;12:53. doi: 10.1186/1471-2288-12-53.
Compliance is a critical issue for parental questionnaires in school based epidemiological surveys and high compliance is difficult to achieve. The objective of this study was to determine trends and factors associated with parental questionnaire compliance during respiratory health surveys of school children in Merseyside between 1991 and 2006.
Four cross-sectional respiratory health surveys employing a core questionnaire and methodology were conducted in 1991, 1993, 1998 and 2006 among 5-11 year old children in the same 10 schools in Bootle and 5 schools in Wallasey, Merseyside. Parental compliance fell sequentially in consecutive surveys. This analysis aimed to determine the association of questionnaire compliance with variation in response rates to specific questions across surveys, and the demographic profiles for parents of children attending participant schools.
Parental questionnaire compliance was 92% (1872/2035) in 1991, 87.4% (3746/4288) in 1993, 78.1% (1964/2514) in 1998 and 30.3% (1074/3540) in 2006. The trend to lower compliance in later surveys was consistent across all surveyed schools. Townsend score estimations of socio-economic status did not differ between schools with high or low questionnaire compliance and were comparable across the four surveys with only small differences between responders and non-responders to specific core questions. Respiratory symptom questions were mostly well answered with fewer than 15% of non-responders across all surveys. There were significant differences between mean child age, maternal and paternal smoking prevalence, and maternal employment between the four surveys (all p < 0.01). Out-migration did not differ between surveys (p = 0.256) with three quarters of parents resident for at least 3 years in the survey areas.
Methodological differences or changes in socio-economic status of respondents between surveys were unlikely to explain compliance differences. Changes in maternal employment patterns may have been contributory. This analysis demonstrates a major shift in community parental questionnaire compliance over a 15 year period to 2006. Parental questionnaire compliance must be factored into survey designs and methodologies.
在基于学校的流行病学调查中，家长问卷的依从性是一个关键问题，而要达到高度的依从性是很困难的。本研究的目的是确定在 1991 年至 2006 年期间，默西塞德郡学龄儿童呼吸道健康调查中，与家长问卷依从性相关的趋势和因素。
在 1991 年、1993 年、1998 年和 2006 年，在布特尔和沃尔斯利的 10 所和 5 所学校中，对 5-11 岁的儿童进行了四次横断面呼吸道健康调查，采用核心问卷和方法。家长的依从性在连续的调查中依次下降。本分析旨在确定问卷依从性与调查中特定问题的应答率变化以及参加学校儿童家长的人口统计学特征之间的关联。
1991 年家长问卷的依从率为 92%（1872/2035），1993 年为 87.4%（3746/4288），1998 年为 78.1%（1964/2514），2006 年为 30.3%（1074/3540）。在后来的调查中依从性降低的趋势在所有被调查的学校中是一致的。社会经济地位的城镇人口得分估计在高问卷依从性和低问卷依从性的学校之间没有差异，并且在四个调查中是可比的，只有在特定核心问题的应答者和非应答者之间存在微小差异。呼吸道症状问题的回答大多很好，在所有调查中，不到 15%的非应答者。四个调查之间儿童年龄、母亲和父亲吸烟率以及母亲就业情况存在显著差异（均 p <0.01）。调查之间的迁出率没有差异（p=0.256），四分之三的父母在调查地区居住至少 3 年。
调查之间方法学的差异或应答者社会经济地位的变化不太可能解释依从性差异。母亲就业模式的变化可能是促成因素。本分析表明，在 15 年的时间里，社区家长问卷的依从性发生了重大转变，到 2006 年达到了 2006 年。家长问卷的依从性必须纳入调查设计和方法中。
