Factors Affecting Clinician Engagement In Recruitment For Dementia Trials

A randomised controlled trial of tailored walking for the manage-ment of Behavioural and Psychological Symptoms of Dementia (BPSD)experienced very poor recruitment despite strong support from stake-holders. From a population exceeding two thousand people with demen-tia only six participants were recruited in the first six months despiteminimal exclusion criteria. Consequently we invited clinicians to facil-itated roundtable discussions on their perceptions of research, impedi-ments to their role as recruiters and ways to enhance recruitment. Sev-eral impediments to clinicians identifying participants to the study teamemerged, including: Clinicians feeling accountable for the research;concerns about overburdening participants; anxiety about participantsonce the research ended; concern about participants feelings if allocatedto the control group; clinicians deciding on behalf of their patients thatthis research was a low priority and lack of perceived rewards for refer-ring participants. Addressing these concerns led to far better recruit-ment rates.