Institute for Research in Operative Medicine, Chair of Surgical Research, Faculty of Health, School of Medicine, Witten/Herdecke University, Ostmerheimer Str, 200 51109, Cologne, Germany.
BMC Med Res Methodol. 2018 Aug 16;18(1):86. doi: 10.1186/s12874-018-0544-4.
Financial rewards have been shown to be an important motivator to include normal healthy volunteers in trials. Less emphasis has been put on non-healthy volunteers. No previous study has investigated the impact of a voucher incentive for participants in a cross-sectional study in a clinical setting. The objective of this study was to examine the impact of a small voucher incentive on a survey response rate in a clinical setting at the point-of-care in a quasi-randomized controlled trial (q-RCT).
This was an ancillary study to a survey of patients subsequent to their appointment with a physician investigating physician-patient communication. We randomized participants to receive or not receive a voucher for a coffee (costs: 1 €) enclosed in the survey package. Alternation of groups was performed on a weekly basis. The exact Chi-square test was used to compare response rates between study arms.
In total, 472 participants received the survey package. Among them, 249 participants were quasi-randomized to the voucher arm and 223 to the control group. The total response rate was 46%. The response rates were 48% in the voucher arm and 44% in the control group. The corresponding risk ratio was 1.09 (95% CI: 0.89, 1.32).
A small voucher incentive to increase the response rate in a survey investigating physician-patient communication was unlikely to have an impact. It can be speculated whether the magnitude of the voucher was too low to generate an impact. This should be further investigated in future real-world studies.
已证明经济奖励是招募健康志愿者参与试验的重要激励因素。而非健康志愿者的激励因素则较少受到关注。之前没有研究调查过在临床环境下的横断面研究中为参与者提供代金券激励对研究结果的影响。本研究的目的是在临床环境下的一项准随机对照试验（q-RCT）中，检验在即时护理点向参与者提供小额代金券激励对调查响应率的影响。
这是一项对接受医生诊疗的患者进行调查后的辅助研究，旨在调查医患沟通。我们将参与者随机分配到接受或不接受包含在调查包中的咖啡代金券（成本：1 欧元）。分组交替每周进行。确切的卡方检验用于比较研究组之间的响应率。
总共 472 名参与者收到了调查包。其中，249 名参与者被准随机分配到代金券组，223 名参与者被分配到对照组。总响应率为 46%。代金券组的响应率为 48%，对照组的响应率为 44%。相应的风险比为 1.09（95%CI：0.89，1.32）。
增加医患沟通调查响应率的小额代金券激励不太可能产生影响。可以推测代金券的金额是否太低，不足以产生影响。这应在未来的真实世界研究中进一步调查。
