Allowing physicians to choose the value of compensation for participation in a web-based survey: Randomized controlled trial

Background: survey response rates among physicians are declining,and determining an appropriate level of compensation to motivate participation poses a major challenge. objective: to estimate the effect of permitting intensive care physicians to select their preferred level of compensation for completing a short web-based survey on physician (1) response rate,(2) survey completion rate,(3) time to response,and (4) time spent completing the survey. methods: a total of 1850 us intensivists from an existing database were randomized to receive a survey invitation email with or without an amazon.com incentive available to the first 100 respondents. the incentive could be instantly redeemed for an amount chosen by the respondent,up to a maximum of us $50. results: the overall response rate was 35.90% (630/1755). among the 35.4% (111/314) of eligible participants choosing the incentive,80.2% (89/111) selected the maximum value. among intensivists offered an incentive,the response was 6.0% higher (95% ci 1.5-10.5,p=.01),survey completion was marginally greater (807/859,94.0% vs 892/991,90.0%; p=.06),and the median number of days to survey response was shorter (0.8,interquartile range [iqr] 0.2-14.4 vs 6.6,iqr 0.3-22.3; p=.001),with no difference in time spent completing the survey. conclusions: permitting intensive care physicians to determine compensation level for completing a short web-based survey modestly increased response rate and substantially decreased response time without decreasing the time spent on survey completion. ©alison e turnbull,cristi l o'connor,bryan lau,scott d halpern,dale m needham.