Tsaltskan Vladislav, Sanchez Baez Roel, Firestein Gary S
Department of Medicine, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA, USA.
J Clin Transl Sci. 2023 Aug 7;7(1):e180. doi: 10.1017/cts.2023.596. eCollection 2023.
Recruitment of study participants is challenging and can incur significant costs. Social media advertising is a promising method for recruiting clinical studies and may improve cost efficiency by targeting populations likely to match a study's qualifications. Prior systematic reviews of social media as a recruitment tool have been favourable, however, there are no meta-analyses of its cost-effectiveness.
Studies evaluating recruitment costs through social media and non-social media methods were identified on MEDLINE and EMBASE. Articles were screened through a two-step process in accordance with PRISMA guidelines. Cost data were extracted from selected articles and meta-analyzed using the Mantel-Haenszel method. The primary outcome was the relative cost-effectiveness of social media compared to non-social media recruitment, defined as the odds ratio of recruiting a participant per US dollar spent. The secondary outcome was the cost-effectiveness of social media recruitment compared to other online recruitment methods only.
In total, 23 studies were included in the meta-analysis. The odds ratio of recruiting a participant through social media advertising compared to non-social media methods per dollar spent was 1.97 [95% CI 1.24-3.00, = 0.004]. The odds ratio of recruiting a participant through social media compared to other online methods only was 1.66 [95% CI 1.02-2.72, = 0.04].
Social media advertising may be more cost-effective than other methods of recruitment, however, the magnitude of cost-effectiveness is highly variable between studies. There are limited data on newer social media platforms and on difficult-to-reach populations such as non-English speakers or older individuals.
招募研究参与者具有挑战性，且可能产生高昂成本。社交媒体广告是招募临床研究参与者的一种有前景的方法，通过针对可能符合研究条件的人群，有望提高成本效益。此前关于将社交媒体作为招募工具的系统评价结果良好，然而，尚无对其成本效益的荟萃分析。
在MEDLINE和EMBASE上检索评估通过社交媒体和非社交媒体方法进行招募的成本的研究。文章按照PRISMA指南分两步进行筛选。从选定的文章中提取成本数据，并使用Mantel-Haenszel方法进行荟萃分析。主要结局是社交媒体与非社交媒体招募相比的相对成本效益，定义为每花费1美元招募一名参与者的比值比。次要结局是仅将社交媒体招募与其他在线招募方法相比的成本效益。
荟萃分析共纳入23项研究。与非社交媒体方法相比，通过社交媒体广告每花费1美元招募一名参与者的比值比为1.97[95%CI 1.24 - 3.00，P = 0.004]。仅将社交媒体与其他在线方法相比，招募一名参与者的比值比为1.66[95%CI 1.02 - 2.72，P = 0.04]。
社交媒体广告可能比其他招募方法更具成本效益，然而，不同研究之间成本效益的程度差异很大。关于较新的社交媒体平台以及难以接触到的人群（如非英语使用者或老年人）的数据有限。
