Recruitment strategies for the racial disparities in Parkinson's disease study: Partnering with patients from the Black community.

INTRODUCTION

Most Parkinson's Disease (PD) studies fail to recruit diverse racial and ethnic groups in their study sample. PD research mainly contains data from White PD patients and fails to reflect the experiences of Black PD patients and other individuals from underrepresented groups/minorities. This paper aims to describe effective recruitment strategies in the Black PD population.

METHODS

The NIH-funded Racial Disparities in PD project is an ongoing multi-center study comparing phenotype, management, and genotype between Black and White PD patients. A REDCap survey was distributed to all seven study sites to be completed by coordinators from each site. The survey included questions about recruitment strategies, effectiveness of strategies, recruitment barriers, communication strategies, and approaches to follow-up.

RESULTS

The most common recruitment strategies (in order of effectiveness) are monitoring patient schedules through Epic or other software, collaborating with clinical colleagues (referrals), and flyers/posters in public spaces. Study coordinators use in-person or telephone calls as a form of recruitment communication. The major barriers to recruitment are financial or time constraints.

DISCUSSION: The most effective recruitment strategies are monitoring patient schedules and collaborating with the site investigator and other clinicians. Coordinators find that approaching patients in the clinic with study flyers helps sustain recruitment. Clinician-patient relationships are also important to increase recruitment due to preexisting relationships. Fostering trust with participants greatly impacts successful recruitment. Finding solutions to participant barriers has been successful in maintaining recruitment numbers.