• Vichithranie W Madurasinghe, Peter Knapp, Sandra Eldridge, David Collier, Shaun Treweek, Jo Rick, Jonathan Graffy, Adwoa Parker, Chris Salisbury, David Torgerson, Kate Jolly, Manbinder S Sidhu, Christopher Fife-Schaw, Mark A Hull, Kirsty Sprange, Elizabeth Brettell, Sunil Bhandari, Alan Montgomery, and Peter Bower.
• Nuffield Department of Population Health, University of Oxford, Richard Doll Building, Old Road Campus, Roosevelt Drive, Oxford, OX3 7LF, UK.
• Bmc Med. 2023 Nov 8; 21 (1): 425425.

BackgroundPeople need high-quality information to make decisions about research participation. Providing information in written format alone is conventional but may not be the most effective and acceptable approach. We developed a structure for the presentation of information using multimedia which included generic and trial-specific content. Our aim was to embed 'Studies Within A Trial' (SWATs) across multiple ongoing trials to test whether multimedia presentation of patient information led to better rates of recruitment.MethodsFive trials included a SWAT and randomised their participants to receive a multimedia presentation alongside standard information, or standard written information alone. We collected data on trial recruitment, acceptance and retention and analysed the pooled results using random effects meta-analysis, with the primary outcome defined as the proportion of participants randomised following an invitation to take part.ResultsFive SWATs provided data on the primary outcome of proportion of participants randomised. Multimedia alongside written information results in little or no difference in recruitment rates (pooled odds ratio = 0.96, 95% CI: 0.79 to 1.17, p-value = 0.671, I2 = 0%). There was no effect on any other outcomes.ConclusionsMultimedia alongside written information did not improve trial recruitment rates.Trial RegistrationISRCTN71952900, ISRCTN 06710391, ISRCTN 17160087, ISRCTN05926847, ISRCTN62869767.© 2023. The Author(s).

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