title: Community-based strategies for focus group recruitment of minority veterans.
abstract: Minority recruitment is crucial to successful clinical research and associated community-based outreach programs. Reaching and retaining a diverse sample is particularly challenging when research targets not only ethnic or racial minorities but also subcultural groups such as veterans of different war periods. We describe various strategies that address the special challenges of minority recruitment through our experience engaging an ethnically diverse sample of 258 veterans as part of an evaluation of ambulatory care services at Department of Veterans Affairs health care facilities. Most veterans were recruited by liaison with the community center, which accounted for 29% of the total sample. Other strategies included on-site recruitment (21%), word of mouth (21%), mailings to veterans' organizations (12%), and newspaper advertisements (7%). Strategies varied in their effectiveness at reaching specific racial or ethnic groups and veterans from different cohorts of war service.
authors.affiliation: Department of Veterans Affairs Greater Los Angeles Healthcare System, School of Medicine, University of California, Los Angeles, CA, USA.
authors.forename: Shawkat
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Dhanani
authors.forename: JoAnn
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Damron-Rodriguez
authors.forename: Margaret
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Leung
authors.forename: Valentine
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Villa
authors.forename: Donna L
authors.initials: DL
authors.lastname: Washington
authors.forename: Takashi
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Makinodan
authors.forename: Nancy
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Harada
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D016009:Chi-Square Distribution; D002986:Clinical Trials as Topic; D017144:Focus Groups; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D008913:Minority Groups; D018579:Patient Selection; D012107:Research Design; D014481:United States; D014728:Veterans