GP survey response rate: a miscellany of influencing factors (original) (raw)
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Surveying general practitioners: does a low response rate matter?
The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners, 1997
Primary care has long been of interest to policy research. Recently, there is evidence to suggest that it is becoming more difficult to encourage GPs (general practitioners) to participate in surveys. As low response rates can introduce bias into survey results, it is important to study the effects of non-response. To assess the validity of a response rate of 44% obtained in a national postal study of GPs surveyed about their work with alcohol-misusing patients by assessing the extent of any non-response bias. A telephone survey of 148 GPs who had not responded to repeated mailings of a postal questionnaire was undertaken. In addition to personal and practice structure characteristics, the GPs were asked three questions taken from the original questionnaire about their work with alcohol-misusing patients. Of the 148 GPs telephoned, 64 responded to the telephone questionnaire in full; all had previously failed to respond to the postal questionnaire. Younger GPs were more likely to re...
BMC Family Practice, 2009
Background: The UK National GP Patient Survey is one of the largest ever survey programmes of patients registered to receive primary health care, inviting five million respondents to report their experience of NHS primary healthcare. The third such annual survey (2008/9) involved the development of a new survey instrument. We describe the process of that development, and the findings of an extensive pilot survey in UK primary healthcare. Methods: The survey was developed following recognised guidelines and involved expert and stakeholder advice, cognitive testing of early versions of the survey instrument, and piloting of the questionnaire in a cross sectional pilot survey of 1,500 randomly selected individuals from the UK electoral register with two reminders to non-respondents. Results: The questionnaire comprises 66 items addressing a range of aspects of UK primary healthcare. A response rate of 590/1500 (39.3%) was obtained. Non response to individual items ranged from 0.8% to 15.3% (median 5.2%). Participants did not always follow internal branching instructions in the questionnaire although electronic controls allow for correction of this problem in analysis. There was marked skew in the distribution of responses to a number of items indicating an overall favourable impression of care. Principal components analysis of 23 items offering evaluation of various aspects of primary care identified three components (relating to doctor or nurse care, or addressing access to care) accounting for 68.3% of the variance in the sample. Conclusion: The GP Patient Survey has been carefully developed and pilot-tested. Survey findings, aggregated at practice level, will be used to inform the distribution of £65 million ($107 million) of UK NHS resource in 2008/9 and this offers the opportunity for NHS service planners and providers to take account of users' experiences of health care in planning and delivering primary healthcare in the UK.
Journal of Medical Internet Research, 2017
Background: Web-based surveys have become a new and popular method for collecting data, but only a few studies have directly compared postal and Web-based surveys among physicians, and none to our knowledge among general practitioners (GPs). Objective: Our aim is to compare two modes of survey delivery (postal and Web-based) in terms of participation rates, response times, and completeness of questionnaires in a study assessing GPs' preventive practices. Methods: This randomized study was conducted in Western Switzerland (Geneva and Vaud) and in France (Alsace and Pays de la Loire) in 2015. A random selection of community-based GPs (1000 GPs in Switzerland and 2400 GPs in France) were randomly allocated to receive a questionnaire about preventive care activities either by post (n=700 in Switzerland, n=400 in France) or by email (n=300 in Switzerland, n=2000 in France). Reminder messages were sent once in the postal group and twice in the Web-based group. Any GPs practicing only complementary and alternative medicine were excluded from the study. Results: Among the 3400 contacted GPs, 764 (22.47%, 95% CI 21.07%-23.87%) returned the questionnaire. Compared to the postal group, the participation rate in the Web-based group was more than four times lower (246/2300, 10.70% vs 518/1100, 47.09%, P<.001), but median response time was much shorter (1 day vs 1-3 weeks, P<.001) and the number of GPs having fully completed the questionnaire was almost twice as high (157/246, 63.8% vs 179/518, 34.6%, P<.001). Conclusions: Web-based surveys offer many advantages such as reduced response time, higher completeness of data, and large cost savings, but our findings suggest that postal surveys can be still considered for GP research. The use of mixed-mode approaches is probably a good strategy to increase GPs' participation in surveys while reducing costs.
Australian Journal of Primary Health, 2014
Surveys of GPs are essential to facilitate future planning and delivery of health services. However, recruitment of GPs into research has been disappointing with response rates declining over recent years. This study identified factors that facilitated or hampered GP recruitment in a recent survey of Australian GPs where a range of strategies were used to improve recruitment following poor initial responses. GP response rates for different stages of the survey were examined and compared with reasons GPs and leaders of university research networks cited for non-participation. Poor initial response rates were improved by including a questionnaire in the mail-out, changing the mail-out source from an unknown research team to locally known network leaders, approaching a group of GPs known to have research and training interests, and offering financial compensation. Response rates increased from below 1% for the first wave to 14.5% in the final wave. Using a known and trusted network of professionals to endorse the survey combined with an explicit compensation payment significantly enhanced GP response rates. To obtain response rates for surveys of GPs that are high enough to sustain external validity requires an approach that persuades GPs and their gatekeepers that it is worth their time to participate.
BMC Family Practice, 2013
Background: The General Practice Assessment Questionnaire (GPAQ) has been widely used to assess patient experience in general practice in the UK since 2004. In 2013, new regulations were introduced by the General Medical Council (GMC) requiring UK doctors to undertake periodic revalidation, which includes assessment of patient experience for individual doctors. We describe the development of a new version of GPAQ-GPAQ-R which addresses the GMC's requirements for revalidation as well as additional NHS requirements for surveys that GPs may need to carry out in their own practices. Methods: Questionnaires were given out by doctors or practice staff after routine consultations in line with the guidance given by the General Medical Council for surveys to be used for revalidation. Data analysis and practice reports were provided independently. Results: Data were analysed for questionnaires from 7258 patients relating to 164 GPs in 29 general practices. Levels of missing data were generally low (typically 4.5-6%). The number of returned questionnaires required to achieve reliability of 0.7 were around 35 for individual doctor communication items and 29 for a composite score based on doctor communication items. This suggests that the responses to GPAQ-R had similar reliability to the GMC's own questionnaire and we recommend 30 completed GPAQ-R questionnaires are sufficient for revalidation purposes. However, where an initial screen raises concern, the survey might be repeated with 50 completed questionnaires in order to increase reliability. Conclusions: GPAQ-R is a development of a well-established patient experience questionnaire used in general practice in the UK since 2004. This new version can be recommended for use in order to meet the UK General Medical Council's requirements for surveys to be used in revalidation of doctors. It also meets the needs of GPs to ask about patient experience relating to aspects of practice care that are not specific to individual general practitioners (e.g. receptionists, telephone access) which meet other survey requirements of the National Health Service in England. Use of GPAQ-R has the potential to reduce the number of surveys that GPs need to carry out in their practices to meet the various regulatory requirements which they face.
Response rates in GP surveys - trialling two recruitment strategies
Australian family physician, 2011
This study aimed to examine the efficacy of two strategies for improving general practitioner response to a survey. A secondary aim was to assess GPs' self reported preferred mode of survey administration. This study aimed to examine the efficacy of two strategies for improving general practitioner response to a survey. A secondary aim was to assess GPs' self reported preferred mode of survey administration. Of the 1666 GPs sampled, 52 were ineligible and 500 completed the survey. The response rates obtained in the trial of standard research group letterhead invitations alone (25.8%) versus division of general practice cover letter (32.5%) were not statistically significantly different; nor were the response rates obtained in the trial of a telephone reminder call. When asked about preferred mode of survey administration, 81.1% of respondents nominated mailed survey. The study failed to identify strategies to improve GP participation in the survey. This survey found no basis...