Recruitment and Participation of Older Lesbian and Bisexual Women in Intervention Research

Very little research has addressed issues of recruitment and participation of lesbian and bisexual (LB) women, aged 40 and older, into research studies. This study is based on a larger cross-site intervention study that recruited women from five geographic regions in the United States for culturally specific LB healthy weight programs, lasting 12 or 16 weeks.

Principal investigators (PIs) of the five intervention programs completed a questionnaire on recruitment and participation strategies and barriers. Participant data on completion and sociodemographic variables were compiled and analyzed.

The recruitment strategies the programs' PIs identified as most useful included word-of-mouth participant referrals, emails to LB participants' social networks, and use of electronic health records (at the two clinic-based programs) to identify eligible participants. Flyers and web postings were considered the least useful. Once in the program, participation and completion rates were fairly high (approximately 90%), although with varying levels of engagement in the different programs. Women who were younger or single were more likely to drop out. Women with disabilities had a lower participation/completion rate (82%) than women without any disability (93%). Dropouts were associated with challenges in scheduling (time of day, location) and changes in health status.

Implementation of key strategies can improve both recruitment and participation, but there is a great need for further study of best practices to recruit and promote participation of LB women for health intervention research.