RECRUITING PHYSICIANS FOR OFFICE-BASED RESEARCH

OBJECTIVES. Research conducted in community outpatient offices can pro vide insight into the common experiences of patients and physicians. H owever, recruiting physicians to participate in office-based research is challenging and few descriptions of methods that have been used to successfully recruit random samples of physicians are available. This article describes recruitment strategies utilized in a project that ac hieved high rates of participation from community-based primary care p hysicians and surgeons. METHODS. Recruitment methods included the use of advisory boards to identify potential barriers to participation, us e of respected members of the medical community as recruiters, and obt aining endorsements from physician organizations and prominent members of the medical community. RESULTS. Overall, 81% of physicians contact ed from a sample frame agreed to participate in the project. Participa ting physicians most frequently reported that they participated becaus e the project could provide them with feedback about their interviewin g style. CONCLUSIONS. The recruitment methods described here can be ge neralized to other types of investigations.