%0 Journal Article
%T Effect of prize draw incentive on the response rate to a postal survey of obstetricians and gynaecologists: A randomised controlled trial. [ISRCTN32823119]
%A Sharon H Moses
%A T Justin Clark
%J BMC Health Services Research
%D 2004
%I BioMed Central
%R 10.1186/1472-6963-4-14
%X A randomised controlled trial was conducted. This involved sending a postal questionnaire to all Consultant Obstetricians and Gynaecologists in the United Kingdom. Recipients were randomised to receiving a questionnaire offering a prize draw incentive (on response) or no such incentive.The response rate for recipients offered the prize incentive was 64% (461/716) and 62% (429/694) in the no incentive group (relative rate of response 1.04, 95% CI 0.96 ¨C 1.13)The offer of a prize draw incentive to win a PDA did not significantly increase response rates to a national questionnaire survey of consultant obstetricians and gynaecologists.Postal surveys are commonly used in medical research as an efficient method of obtaining information about medical practitioners attributes, behaviours, attitudes and beliefs. There is evidence that response rates to surveys are declining in general practice [1] and this trend may also be reflected in hospital based medicine. This is of concern as the external validity of the findings from these surveys is dependent upon adequate response rates [1]. Therefore the identification of effective strategies to increase response rates is important to improve the quality and generalisability of such health research.In two earlier randomised controlled trials, we reported no effect on the rate of response to a medical questionnaire of paper quality or provision of a complimentary pen [2,3]. A recently published systematic review showed that monetary incentives doubled the odds of response in the general population. Furthermore, it demonstrated that non-monetary incentives may also be effective in improving response rates by a smaller degree, although the effect varied according to population and type of incentive [4]. In order to further test the impact of non-monetary incentives on survey response by medical professionals, we hypothesised that entry into a prize draw to win a personal digital assistant (PDA) would increase response to a survey of
%U http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6963/4/14