TY - JOUR AU - Admon, Lindsay AU - Haefner, Jessica K AU - Kolenic, Giselle E AU - Chang, Tammy AU - Davis, Matthew M AU - Moniz, Michelle H PY - 2016 DA - 2016/12/21 TI - Recruiting Pregnant Patients for Survey Research: A Head to Head Comparison of Social Media-Based Versus Clinic-Based Approaches JO - J Med Internet Res SP - e326 VL - 18 IS - 12 KW - pregnant women KW - surveys and questionnaires KW - methods KW - social media AB - Background: Recruiting a diverse sample of pregnant women for clinical research is a challenging but crucial task for improving obstetric services and maternal and child health outcomes. Objective: To compare the feasibility and cost of recruiting pregnant women for survey research using social media-based and clinic-based approaches. Methods: Advertisements were used to recruit pregnant women from the social media website Facebook. In-person methods were used to recruit pregnant women from the outpatient clinic of a large, tertiary care center. In both approaches, potential respondents were invited to participate in a 15-minute Web-based survey. Each recruitment method was monitored for 1 month. Using bivariate statistics, we compared the number, demographic characteristics, and health characteristics of women recruited and the cost per completed survey for each recruitment method. Results: The social media-based approach recruited 1178 women and the clinic-based approach recruited 219 women. A higher proportion of subjects recruited through social media identified as African American (29.4%, 207/705 vs 11.2%, 20/179), reported household incomes