Surveying general practitioners: a new avenue

Abstract

Responses to questionnaire surveys are equally valid when administered via an educational meeting or by post. The value of the educational meeting approach was the relative ease of administering the questionnaire and the rapid turn around of replies. However this method may exclude the views of part-time practitioners who were more likely to fail to attend. These practitioners may need to be targeted by alternative routes in questionnaire surveys.

Palliative Radiotherapy Knowledge Among Community Family Physicians and Nurses

“…The 59% response rate among respondents is a limitation of the study, but we were satisfied with this because it is comparable to other surveys in the published literature. 31,32 It is our belief that the results probably do reflect the situation in our region because some of the findings have been previously documented in our region. 33 Although a majority of respondents had an accurate general understanding of PR, there was considerable uncertainty in identifying the appropriate indications for PR.…”

The prognosis of joint pain in the older patient: General practitioners’ views on discussing and estimating prognosis

“…This sample frame was chosen to reflect ''expert'' GP opinion, and to maximize response. Achieving high response rates is notoriously difficult in questionnaire studies of GPs (6,7), and using educational meetings to solicit the views of GPs has been recommended as an appropriate alternative strategy (8).…”

Strategies to engage family physicians in primary care research: A systematic review

“…We identified 4859 deduped records, from which 189 were screened at full text (Figure 2). A total of 41 studies were included and analyzed 23–63 …”

“…Effective communication allows family physicians to feel engaged in the project by reassuring them that the project is running smoothly, and it offers an opportunity to quickly identify implementation issues as they arose. Partnership with an academic affiliated organization 18 (51) Personalized letter 15 (43) Peer recruitment 13 (37) Individual face-to-face recruitment (during a conference or visit at the clinic) 13 (37) On-site research project presentation to the clinical team 4 (11) strategies to develop these relationships: regular phone calls to the practice, newsletters to inform participants about the study progress, having an on-site contact person with whom the research team can easily communicate or on-site visits. 33,38,39,45,47,52,53,60…”