Google AdWords and Facebook Ads for Recruitment of Pregnant Women into a Prospective Cohort Study With Long-Term Follow-Up

Gelder, Marleen M.H.J. van; Belt, Tom H van de; Engelen, L.; Hooijer, Robin; Bredie, S.J.H.; Roeleveld, Nel

doi:10.1007/s10995-019-02797-2

Cited by 23 publications

(21 citation statements)

References 37 publications

(49 reference statements)

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“…While they conclude that online recruitment was more successful than o ine, only 3.6% of their actual participants were recruited via Facebook advertisements. Finally, Van Gelder et al, [62] reported greater success with traditional methods than paid Facebook promotions regarding recruitment of pregnant women into their prospective, long-term longitudinal study. They also report, similar to the current study, lower participation rates among women recruited through Facebook vs traditional methods.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Food, Feelings, and Family Study: Comparison of the efficacy of traditional methods, social media, and broadcast email to recruit pregnant women to an observational, longitudinal nutrition study.

Smith¹,

Alvarez²,

Crixell³

et al. 2020

Preprint

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Background: It is well known that recruitment is a challenging aspect of any study involving human subjects. This challenge is exacerbated when the population sought is reticent to participate in research as is the case with pregnant women and individuals with depression. This paper compares recruitment methods used for the Food, Feelings, and Family Study, an observational, longitudinal study concerning how diet and bisphenol A exposure affect maternal mood and cognitive function during and after pregnancy.Methods: Pregnant women were recruited to this study using traditional methods, social media including paid and unpaid posts, and emails broadcast to the university community. Contingency analysis using the Pearson’s Chi-square test was used to determine if recruitment method was associated with likelihood of participation. T-tests were used to analyze Facebook advertisement success. ANOVAs and contingency analysis using the maximum likelihood ratio Chi-square test were used to determine if recruitment method was related to continuous and categorical demographics, respectively.Results: Social media resulted in the largest number of recruits, followed by traditional methods and broadcast email. Women recruited through social media were less likely to participate, in part, because they were less likely to meet eligibility criteria. In contrast, use of broadcast email resulted in a smaller pool of recruits but these recruits were more likely to be eligible for and complete the study. Most women recruited via social media were the result of unpaid posts to the study’s Facebook page. Paid posts lasting at least 4 days were the most successful. Recruitment method was not associated with participant demographics.Conclusions: Social media has the potential to recruit a large pool of potential subjects; however, when studies require a large time investment such as the case here, women recruited through social media are less likely to participate and complete the study than women recruited through other means.Trial registration: N/A. This study does not describe a health care intervention.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Food, Feelings, and Family Study: Comparison of the efficacy of traditional methods, social media, and broadcast email to recruit pregnant women to an observational, longitudinal nutrition study.

Smith¹,

Alvarez²,

Crixell³

et al. 2020

Preprint

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“…We partnered with “Moeders voor Moeders” (Mothers for Mothers), an organisation that collects urine from women between gestational weeks 6 and 16 to extract human chorionic gonadotropin for the production of medication used in fertility treatment. Furthermore, we implemented intermittent Facebook and Google AdWords advertisements, participated in exhibitions at pregnancy fairs, and placed advertisements in magazines targeted at pregnant women.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The non‐traditional methods of recruitment not only added more inclusions, but also more diversity to the PRIDE Study population, especially in terms of maternal level of education. In terms of absolute numbers, however, the contribution of the online recruitment methods was limited and needs further refinement and extension, for example through optimal budget settings and addition of other social media . Furthermore, we are grateful for the collaboration with “Moeders voor Moeders,” but are unaware of similar initiatives in other countries.…”

Section: Commentmentioning

confidence: 99%

The PRIDE Study: Evaluation of online methods of data collection

Gelder

Merkus

Drongelen

et al. 2019

Paediatric Perinatal Epid

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Background Large birth cohort studies are extremely valuable in assessing associations between early life exposures and long‐term outcomes. Establishing new birth cohorts is challenging due to declining participation rates. Online methods of data collection may increase feasibility, but have not been evaluated thoroughly. Objective The primary objective of the ongoing PRegnancy and Infant DEvelopment (PRIDE) Study is to identify exposures during pregnancy and in early life that may affect short‐term or long‐term health of mother and/or child. In this manuscript, we aimed to evaluate methods of recruitment and online data collection applied. Population Dutch women aged ≥18 years in early pregnancy. Design Prospective cohort study. Methods Initially, only prenatal care providers recruited participants, but alternative recruitment methods were added as a result of disappointing participation rates, including collaboration with “Moeders voor Moeders” (organisation that visits women in early pregnancy) and Facebook advertisements. Data on demographic characteristics, obstetric history, maternal health, life style factors, occupational exposures, nutrition, pregnancy complications, and infant outcomes are primarily collected through Web‐based questionnaires at multiple time points during and after pregnancy. Additional data collection components include paternal questionnaires, blood and saliva sampling, and linkage to medical records. Preliminary results By September 2019, 9573 women were included in the PRIDE Study, of which 1.3% completed paper‐based questionnaires. Mean age of the women analysed was 30.6 years, 71.1% had a high level of education, 57.2% were primiparae, and mean gestational age at enrolment was 9.9 (range 3, 37) weeks, with slight differences between recruitment methods. Pregnancy outcome was known for 89.8%. Retention rate at 6 months after the estimated date of delivery was estimated at 70%. Multiple validation studies conducted within the PRIDE Study indicated high data quality. Conclusion(s) Although challenging and time‐consuming, online methods for recruitment and data collection may enable the establishment of new birth cohort studies.

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“…19 , 20 Google Ads Keywords Planner, initially designed for e-commerce campaigns, has been used recently as a tool for the recruitment of Google users to clinical trials. 21 , 22 This tool may also serve as an epidemiological data source and enables both qualitative and quantitative analysis of a large number of keywords associated with the given phrases in the chosen language, location and timeframe. 23 These properties were used in a study on a series of dermatological studies, 23 – 27 as well as in paper on heartburn-related searches across six Western countries.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

‘Dr. Google, I have a stomach ache’ – seasonal variations in abdominal pain: a 4-year retrospective data analysis from Google Ads keywords planner

Kamińśki

Łoniewski

Marlicz

2020

Therap Adv Gastroenterol

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Background: Internet traffic may reflect the prevalence of real-world ailments. The aim of this study was to analyse queries associated with abdominal pain and to investigate seasonal frequency and trends of searches in Poland. Methods: We analysed mean search volume from March 2015 to February 2019 of keywords associated with ‘abdominal pain’ in the Polish language generated from the Google Ads Planner. Keywords were categorised by location, feature or type of pain, concurrent symptoms, frequency and patient groups, etc. We compared differences in search volumes across seasons and years. Results: Overall, 24,673,430 queries were associated with abdominal pain in the period analysed. The number of searches associated with abdominal pain in winter increased by ~30% compared with queries searched in summer. There were significantly more searches related to abdominal pain located in the epigastric, umbilical, hypogastrium, left lumbar, left iliac and right iliac regions combined with vomiting or fever, and acute or burning sensation in cold months. We did not observe any specific patterns of pain in the right lumbar or left hypochondrium region, co-presence of flatulence, acute, cramping or persistent/chronic or strong abdominal pain. Conclusion: Internet queries associated with abdominal pain and related factors have increased in the past 4 years and present a seasonal pattern. Google Ads may be a valuable tool to assess the prevalence of complaints in under-researched regions. The observed trends in queries related to abdominal pain merely reflect the scale of the problem. The reported pattern should be verified in epidemiological studies.

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Google AdWords and Facebook Ads for Recruitment of Pregnant Women into a Prospective Cohort Study With Long-Term Follow-Up

Cited by 23 publications

References 37 publications

The Food, Feelings, and Family Study: Comparison of the efficacy of traditional methods, social media, and broadcast email to recruit pregnant women to an observational, longitudinal nutrition study.

The Food, Feelings, and Family Study: Comparison of the efficacy of traditional methods, social media, and broadcast email to recruit pregnant women to an observational, longitudinal nutrition study.

The PRIDE Study: Evaluation of online methods of data collection

‘Dr. Google, I have a stomach ache’ – seasonal variations in abdominal pain: a 4-year retrospective data analysis from Google Ads keywords planner

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