Background Recruiting participants into clinical trials continues to be a challenge, which can result in study delay or termination. Recent studies have used social media to enhance recruitment outcomes. An assessment of the literature on the use of social media for this purpose is required. Objective This study aims to answer the following questions: (1) How is the use of social media, in combination with traditional approaches to enhance clinical trial recruitment and enrollment, represented in the literature? and (2) Do the data on recruitment and enrollment outcomes presented in the literature allow for comparison across studies? Methods We conducted a comprehensive literature search across 7 platforms to identify clinical trials that combined social media and traditional methods to recruit patients. Study and participant characteristics, recruitment methods, and recruitment outcomes were evaluated and compared. Results We identified 2371 titles and abstracts through our systematic search. Of these, we assessed 95 full papers and determined that 33 studies met the inclusion criteria. A total of 17 studies reported enrollment outcomes, of which 9 achieved or exceeded their enrollment target. The proportion of participants enrolled from social media in these studies ranged from 0% to 49%. Across all 33 studies, the proportion of participants recruited and enrolled from social media varied greatly. A total of 9 studies reported higher enrollment rates from social media than any other methods, and 4 studies reported the lowest cost per enrolled participant from social media. Conclusions While the assessment of the use of social media to improve clinical trial participation is hindered by reporting inconsistencies, preliminary data suggest that social media can increase participation and reduce per-participant cost. The adoption of consistent standards for reporting recruitment and enrollment outcomes is required to advance our understanding and use of social media to support clinical trial success.

BACKGROUND Recruiting participants into clinical trials continues to be a challenge, resulting in study delay or termination. Recent studies have used social media to enhance recruitment outcomes. An assessment of the literature on the use of social media for this purpose is required. OBJECTIVE This study aims to answer the following questions: (1) How is the use of social media along with traditional methods to enhance clinical trial recruitment represented in the literature? (2) Do the data on recruitment and enrollment outcomes presented in the literature allow for comparison across studies? METHODS We conducted a comprehensive literature search across 7 platforms to identify clinical trials that combined social media and traditional methods to recruit patients. Study and participant characteristics, recruitment methods, and recruitment outcomes were evaluated and compared. RESULTS We identified 2,371 titles and abstracts through our systematic search. Of these, we assessed 95 full articles and determined 33 studies met the inclusion criteria. Seventeen studies reported enrollment outcomes, of which 9 achieved or exceeded their enrollment target. The proportion of participants enrolled from social media in these studies ranged from 0-49%. Across all 33 studies, the proportion of participants recruited and enrolled from social media varied greatly. Eight studies reported higher enrollment rates from social media than any other methods. Four studies reported lowest cost per enrolled participant from social media. CONCLUSIONS Social media use as a tool to improve recruitment and enrollment outcomes currently lacks reporting standards. In evaluating benefits from using social media to augment or replace traditional methods, future studies must adopt consistent reporting of recruitment and enrollment outcomes to facilitate valid comparisons of social media and traditional methods. CLINICALTRIAL This scoping review is registered at Open Science Framework.

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Purpose The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the differential effects of help-seeking and product-claim direct-to-consumer advertising (DTCA) on consumers’ attitude toward the ad, intention to seek information and intention to see a doctor. This paper also seeks to examine the underlying mechanism of these effects and the moderating role of advertising literacy. Design/methodology/approach An online experiment was conducted with 130 adults who experienced narcolepsy symptoms and experimental stimuli promoting a fictitious drug for narcolepsy. Findings Help-seeking DTCA generated lower persuasion knowledge activation than product-claim DTCA, resulting in lower skepticism, more favorable attitude toward the ad and higher behavioral intentions. The effects of ad type were stronger among consumers with higher advertising literacy. Originality/value This is the first study that provides a thorough examination of the underlying mechanism of the differential effects of help-seeking vs product-claim DTCA as well as the roles of consumers’ advertising literacy on ad outcomes.