Gerido Lynette Hammond, Tang Xiang, Ernst Brittany, Langford Aisha, He Zhe
School of Information, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL, United States.
Department of Statistics, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL, United States.
J Med Internet Res. 2019 Oct 29;21(10):e15035. doi: 10.2196/15035.
By 2035, it is expected that older adults (aged 65 years and older) will outnumber children and will represent 78 million people in the US population. As the aging population continues to grow, it is critical to reduce disparities in their representation in medical research.
This study aimed to describe sociodemographic characteristics and health and information behaviors as factors that influence US adults' interest in engaging in medical research, beyond participation as study subjects.
Nationally representative cross-sectional data from the 2014 Health Information National Trends Survey (N=3677) were analyzed. Descriptive statistics and weighted multivariable logistic regression analyses were performed to assess predictors of one's interest in patient engagement in medical research. The independent variables included age, general health, income, race and ethnicity, education level, insurance status, marital status, and health information behaviors.
We examined the association between the independent variables and patient interest in engaging in medical research (PTEngage_Interested). Patient interest in engaging in medical research has a statistically significant association with age (adjusted P<.01). Younger adults (aged 18-34 years), lower middle-aged adults (aged 35-49 years), and higher middle-aged adults (aged 50-64 years) indicated interest at relatively the same frequency (29.08%, 29.56%, and 25.12%, respectively), but older adults (aged ≥65 years) expressed less interest (17.10%) than the other age groups. After the multivariate model was run, older adults (odds ratio 0.738, 95% CI 0.500-1.088) were found to be significantly less likely to be interested in engaging in medical research than adults aged 50 to 64 years. Regardless of age, the strongest correlation was found between interest in engaging in medical research and actively looking for health information (P<.001). Respondents who did not seek health information were significantly less likely than those who did seek health information to be interested in engaging in medical research.
Patients' interest in engaging in medical research vary by age and information-seeking behaviors. As the aging population continues to grow, it is critical to reduce disparities in their representation in medical research. Interest in participatory research methods may reflect an opportunity for consumer health informatics technologies to improve the representation of older adults in future medical research.
预计到2035年，美国老年成年人（65岁及以上）的数量将超过儿童，在美国人口中占7800万。随着老年人口持续增长，减少他们在医学研究中的代表性差异至关重要。
本研究旨在描述社会人口学特征以及健康和信息行为，这些因素会影响美国成年人参与医学研究的兴趣，而不仅仅是作为研究对象参与。
分析了2014年健康信息国家趋势调查（N = 3677）中具有全国代表性的横断面数据。进行描述性统计和加权多变量逻辑回归分析，以评估个人对患者参与医学研究兴趣的预测因素。自变量包括年龄、总体健康状况、收入、种族和族裔、教育水平、保险状况、婚姻状况以及健康信息行为。
我们研究了自变量与患者参与医学研究兴趣（PTEngage_Interested）之间的关联。患者参与医学研究的兴趣与年龄存在统计学上的显著关联（调整后P <.01）。年轻成年人（18 - 34岁）、中低年龄成年人（35 - 49岁）和中高年龄成年人（50 - 64岁）表示有兴趣的频率相对相同（分别为29.08%、29.56%和25.12%），但老年成年人（≥65岁）表示有兴趣的比例（17.10%）低于其他年龄组。在运行多变量模型后，发现老年成年人（优势比0.738，95%置信区间0.500 - 1.088）比50至64岁的成年人对参与医学研究感兴趣的可能性显著更低。无论年龄如何，参与医学研究的兴趣与积极寻找健康信息之间的相关性最强（P <.001）。不寻求健康信息的受访者比寻求健康信息的受访者对参与医学研究感兴趣的可能性显著更低。
患者参与医学研究的兴趣因年龄和信息寻求行为而异。随着老年人口持续增长，减少他们在医学研究中的代表性差异至关重要。对参与式研究方法的兴趣可能反映了消费者健康信息技术在未来医学研究中改善老年成年人代表性的一个机会。
