Learn more about the Recruitment Letter Service:
Process
CTSI acts as an honest broker of the EHR data and sends letters to a cohort that meets the study’s inclusion/exclusion criteria. The letter is sent from “Research Participant Services” on the study’s behalf using a template that was developed in coordination with the Institutional Review Board. Interested patients contact the study team directly to learn more about the study or complete pre-screening activities.
The timeline from initiating the request to use the service to sending out the recruitment letters is around 2 months and is dependent on IRB approval. Here's how it works:
1. Submit a Recruitment Consultation Request.
2. Work with your consultant to prepare the recruitment letter (template link). CTSI approval is required before IRB submission.
2. Study team requests IRB approval to add the Recruitment Letter Service as a recruitment method, also including the prepared letter.
3. CTSI Data Intelligence Manager will contact you to initiate and complete the data query process. Once the query is complete, the data results will be co-validated by the research team and Data Intelligence Manager, and then delivered directly to the CTSI Honest Broker.
4. CTSI sends letters to cohort using a schedule determined by the study team.
Depending on how many patients are identified in the search, you may want to narrow the mailing list. CTSI staff can do random sampling of the cohort and can also filter for patients in targeted zip codes.
Feasibility and Planning
Before starting the process to start this service, you can use the UCSF Research Data Browser (RDB) to determine how many patients at UCSF meet your eligibility criteria. The Research Data Browser (RDB) is a point-and-click browsing tool that allows researchers to explore UCSF patient records de-identified from APeX. The RDB does not require IRB approval and is a free, self-service for the UCSF research community.
Registration and account activation is required. Visit the Research Data Browser page for more information.
The rate of return varies for these mailings, but you can expect a 2% enrollment rate, though your results may differ depending on your study. If you do not have comparison studies that have recruited using this method as a benchmark, it is better to be conservative in your estimates.
IRB Approvals
IRB approval is required to use this service. For IRB approval:
1. In the IRB Recruitment section, check the "Other" box and indicate CTSI Consultation Services
2. Use the template language to include in Recruitment section of IRB application:
We are collaborating with the CTSI Consultation Service to provide cohort identification and direct mail for recruitment. The Dear Patient letter (attached) will be sent to individuals identified from the APeX record systems via a data extraction by Academic Research Systems (ARS) of patients with a diagnosis of [XXX]. These patients [are/are not] known to or under the care of the researcher team. The CTSI Consultation Service will coordinate the mailing on behalf of study. Interested subjects will contact the study staff as described in the letter. The data extract will be delivered to the CTSI Consultation Service’s MyResearch account in order to facilitate the direct mail activities while ensuring privacy and confidentiality of the patients identified.
3. In the IRB application "Waiver of Consent/Authorization for Recruitment Purposes" section: Answer all questions and explain what info will be collected prior to obtaining informed consent.
3. Submit your letter as a recruitment material. Recruitment letters should be prepared using the direct mail template and submitted to [email protected] for initial review and feedback before submitting to the IRB.
4. If the study is already approved, CTSI Consultation Services must be added as a modification prior to implementation of this recruitment method.
Privacy of patients
Requests to not be contacted for research
Protecting the privacy of the cohort has been at the forefront of development of this process. The letter template has been developed to appear as general as possible and not include diagnosis information. In the letter template we provide a link to an FAQ site with information about why people were contacted and other information about participating in research at UCSF. If a patient contacts the study with concerns around being contacted to participate in research, it is the study team’s responsibility to provide basic information on the direct mail process and to escalate the inquiry to [email protected] if not able to resolve. All email inquiries or action items resulting from a call should be sent via secure email to [email protected]edu.
Patients reported as deceased
If you are contacted by someone who has received the letter on behalf of a deceased person, please apologize and let them know you will work to update the patient record, then take the following steps:
1. Record the date of death with the patient name and send via secure email to [email protected]. CTSI will ask the APeX team to mark the patient deceased and “do not contact for research”
2. If the date of death is unknown, you can ask the family to contact SheRee Garcia at 415-353-2885 to update the death status. Collect the name of the deceased person and send via secure email to [email protected] for a partial records update.