You've got mail: Using e-mail to recruit a representative cohort for a healthy lifestyles research study Kayla Confer, BS1, Jessica Garber, MPH1, Jody McCullough1, Cynthia Chuang, MD, MSc2, Kathleen McTigue, MD, MPH, MS3, and Jennifer Kraschnewski, MD, MPH2 (1) Penn State Hershey College of Medicine (2) Division of Internal Medicine and Department of Public Health Sciences (3) Division of General Internal Medicine, Department of Medicine, University of Pittsburgh Introduction More than 85% of Americans use the Internet, making e-mail a primary communication method. It is unknown if e-mail recruitment strategies yield representative study samples of the priority population. Methods The PaTH Network is one of 13 clinical data research networks (CDRN) funded by the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI), a nonprofit created through the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. PaTH aimed to recruit a cohort of patients attending bariatric surgery clinics at two academic medical centers in Pennsylvania. Patients who had previously consented to being contacted by e-mail were in the eligible population for e-mail, otherwise patients were in the eligible population for mail. Following the initial e-mail or postal mail invitation, patients were also approached in-person at clinic visits and with telephone calls. Statistical Analysis: Chi-square tests compared sociodemographic characteristics of consented participants to the eligible population, using e-mail and postal mail. Results Both e-mail and letter successfully recruited a study sample that were similar to the eligible patient population in terms of gender, age, race, and ethnicity. Discussion Compared with the eligible populations, the recruited cohorts were not significantly different based on age, gender, race, and ethnicity. Conclusions A representative sample can be obtained by using e-mail as a primary recruitment strategy. The use of a variety of secondary recruitment strategies may have helped to boost study enrollment. Using e-mail for recruitment allows efficient reach to a broad spectrum of patients in a cost-effective manner. Acknowledgements Research reported in this abstract was [partially] funded through a Patient- Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) Award (PCORI CDRN #1306-04912). The statements presented in this work are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the Patient- Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI), its Board of Governors or Methodology Committee. Table 1. Comparison of the characteristics of the consented and eligible populations using e-mail and postal mail for patient recruitment Characteristics E-mail Recruitment Letter Recruitment Eligible Population N = 2059 Consented Cohort N = 100 N = 919 N = 55 Gender (%) p-value = 0.91 p-value = 0.94 Male 16.12 14.00 21.65 21.81 Female 83.88 86.00 78.35 78.18 Age Range (%) p-value = 0.34 p-value = 0.95 18-39 23.36 22.00 28.18 23.63 40-49 27.10 32.00 30.69 29.09 50-59 24.28 24.00 25.68 30.90 60+ 20.25 15.45 18.18 Race (%) p-value = 0.32 p-value = 0.44 White (Caucasian) 81.50 90.00 84.33 96.36 Black or African American 16.61 <10.00 9.14 Not Specified 1.89 5.66 Two or More Races 0.87 Ethnicity (%) p-value = 0.62 Non-Hispanic White 79.89 82.05 94.54 Non-Hispanic Black 16.27 8.60 Other 3.84 9.35