Recruitment and enrollment of rural and urban medically underserved elderly into a randomized trial of telemedicine case management for diabetes care.

Our goal was to identify reasons for enrollment or refusal to participate in a randomized trial of telemedicine case management of diabetes. We performed a prospective survey of participants and non-participants during recruitment for the Informatics for Diabetes Education and Telemedicine (IDEATel) study, a randomized trial of telemedicine case management of diabetes mellitus in medically underserved elderly. There were two recruitment areas: urban New York City, and rural upstate New York. A Participant Questionnaire (PQ) was administered at the baseline IDEATel visit, and a Non-Participant Questionnaire (NPQ) was administered during the recruitment telephone call. Both questionnaires listed possible responses; subjects could choose more than one response or give their own. Of 1,660 IDEATel participants, 99.7% completed the PQ. Most frequent reason for participation was the belief that the technology could help them (52% and 42% of urban and rural respondents, respectively). Of the 2,231 subjects refusi...