title: The impact of consenter characteristics and experience on patient interest in clinical research.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  To explain the historically low rates of participation in cancer clinical trials, several factors have been studied. These include subject characteristics and attitudes, clinical trial availability and eligibility criteria, and physician attitudes and communication skills. However, the impact of nonphysician research personnel, who often consent patients for studies, is unclear. We therefore evaluated the association between consenter characteristics and subject interest in clinical research.
  
  
  METHODS
  We performed a retrospective review of subjects enrolled in a university-based cancer center tissue repository. During enrollment, subjects were asked if they were willing to be contacted in the future to (a) provide medical follow-up information and (b) participate in other clinical research. We analyzed the association between responses to these questions and consenter characteristics using univariate analysis and multivariate logistic regression.
  
  
  RESULTS
  In total, 181 consenters enrolled 922 subjects. The majority of subjects agreed to be contacted for follow-up (84.9%) and future research (83.1%). Subject willingness to be contacted for future research was associated with greater consenter experience in univariate and multivariate analyses. In multivariate analysis, subject willingness to be contacted for future research was associated with discordance between subject and consenter gender, but not with subject gender, race, or income, or consenter gender or race.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Consenter experience and subject-consenter gender discordance were associated with greater subject interest in participating in future research. The role of consenters in clinical research merits future study and should be considered in efforts to increase cancer clinical trial accrual.
authors.affiliation: Division of Hematology-Oncology, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, 5323 Harry Hines Boulevard, Dallas, TX 75390-8852, USA.
authors.forename: Drew W
authors.initials: DW
authors.lastname: Rasco
authors.forename: Yang
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Xie
authors.forename: Jingsheng
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Yan
authors.forename: Jennifer R
authors.initials: JR
authors.lastname: Sayne
authors.forename: Celette Sugg
authors.initials: CS
authors.lastname: Skinner
authors.forename: Jonathan E
authors.initials: JE
authors.lastname: Dowell
authors.forename: David E
authors.initials: DE
authors.lastname: Gerber
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D002986:Clinical Trials as Topic; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000628:therapy*; D010358:Patient Participation; D035842:Research Subjects; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D012737:Sex Factors