Are you in the process of recruiting people for a clinical trial? If so, there are three main ways in which you can recruit participants for your study: advertising on college and university campuses, putting ads in local newspapers and posting the clinical trial on clinicaltrials.gov. This article will explain how you can go about doing each type of recruiting so that you can maximize the potential for getting enough people for your clinical trial.
Instructions
Recruit Participants Using clinicaltrials.gov
1. Get your study approved by a human subject review board or institutional review board. If you are doing a study through a University or other research institution, your institution will most likely have either an institutional review board or human subjects review board. Submit the appropriate paperwork to the review board. Be thorough about the details of your study methods and debriefing process, and include a copy of your informed consent form.
2. Register for a Protocol Registration System account. You are required to first register for a Protocol Registration System account before you can register a clinical trial on clinicaltrials.gov. Go to the Protocol Registration System page (see Resources below) and choose to register for either an organization account or an individual account. If you are the sole investigator on a study, register for an individual account. If there are several people working on the same clinical trial, register for an organization account.
3. Register your clinical trial with clinicaltrials.gov. Within 48 hours, you will receive an email from clinicaltrials.gov. Follow the instructions within the email to register your study.
Recruit Participants with Newspaper Ads
4. Write an ad. Write a short, succinct ad for your newspaper regarding your study. You might say something like, "Depression medication study seeks participants. If interested please call xxx-xxxx or email name@yahoo.com." Be sure to include contact information so that potential participants can get in contact with you for more information and requirements regarding the clinical trial.
5. Get your ad approved. If you are working with other people on a research team, make sure everyone approves of the ad and its wording before you take it to the newspaper.
6. Decide how long you want the ad to run. You can choose to run the ad for 1 day, 1 week or 1 month, for instance.
7. Place the ad in your local newspaper/s. Take a copy of your ad to your local newspaper office and make arrangements with one of the staff members to run the ad. Alternatively, visit your local newspaper's website and e-mail the ad to the classifieds section. You should be able to find an e-mail address for the classifieds section in the "Contact us" section of the website.
Recruit Participants at Colleges and Universities
8. Make fliers and/or sign-up sheets. Include some basic information about the clinical trial on the fliers along with contact information where potential participants can contact you for more information about the study. Include time increments on specific days for participants to sign up for the study. Include a spot for participants to put an email address or phone number to be contacted as well. Additionally, include your contact information on the sign-up sheet.
9. Type a brief description of the study and give it to psychology professors at the university or college. Request that they read the study information to their classes. Be sure to leave your contact information on the sheet for the professors to give to students as well as where the sign-up sheet will be located.
10. Put up the sign-up sheet and fliers. Put the sign-up sheet in a place where many students will see it and can sign up for the study if interested. Put fliers up around campus in order to inform as many students as possible.
Tags: clinical trial, review board, your study, contact information, sign-up sheet, local newspaper