Are Well-Informed Potential Trial Participants More Likely to Participate?. (December 2017)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: de Oliveira, Lucas Lentini Herling; Vissoci, Joao Ricardo Nickenig; Machado, Wagner de Lara; Rodrigues, Clarissa G.; Limkakeng, Alexander T.
• Is Part Of: Journal of empirical research on human research ethics. Volume 12:Number 5(2017)
• Page Start: 363
• Page End: 371
• Publication Date: 2017-12
• Subjects: informed consent -- bioethics -- communication in research -- health services research -- other; Medical ethics -- Research -- Periodicals; Research -- Moral and ethical aspects -- Periodicals; 174.205
• DOI: 10.1177/1556264617737163
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1556-2646

Abstract

Bearing in mind the importance of the informed consent, flaws in this process may be a barrier to participants' recruitment. Our objective was to determine the relationship between the degree of comprehension of the informed consent document plus the importance given to individual elements by potential participants of a hypothetical trial and their willingness to participate in such trials. We performed an Online Survey simulating an emergency department trial recruitment, posteriorly evaluating participants' ratings of importance and self-assessed comprehension of specific topics of the informed consent document. Only 10% of the sample read the entire document. Some specific topics were associated with willingness to participate in the hypothetical trial, but simple composite additive scores of comprehension and importance were not. We concluded that participants in general do not read the entire informed consent document and that importance given to specific topics may influence willingness to participate.