Do we need criteria for patient recruitment? A comparison between England and the Netherlands

2012 Conference

Abstract: Globally many different recruitment criteria exist for selecting patients to be involved in research. For example, in the Netherlands adverts asked for patients/users with ‘a degree’ while in Keele (England) a model was used with only one criteria of ‘having a musculoskeletal condition’. It is clear that recruitment approaches range between more formally defined and open models.

The fundamental issue is how we define ‘lay expertise’ and what contribution this makes to research. By comparing the Dutch and English examples this presentation will begin to address the following questions:

• When a degree is stated as a requirement will this miss out sections of the community who have expertise of the condition researched? Or are users that have been academics better able to cope with the tensions and jargon of participating in research committees as lay representatives in a room full of professionals?
• Or can a case be made for an open invitation to all with the proviso that suitable training and support is given to make sure that users can have a meaningful input? Or do well trained patients then become expert patients – losing their naivety and representativeness?

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