Background: There is a paucity of medical literature describing the specific mechanisms by which the Internet can be used to obtain data from research subjects. Most of the existing literature was based on an email based survey using “Usenet” or “news group” with a suboptimal response rate, which is also error prone due to manually entered data.
Objective: To study the feasibility, effectiveness and convenience of conducting a web based medical survey using CGI script for electronic data entry.
Methods: We designed an interactive HTML questionnaire form using common Graphic Interface (CGI) scripts for data entry. Personalized emails were then sent to all available physician subscribers to PEM_L page (an email based pediatric emergency medicine discussion list server) and other pediatric emergency medicine physician groups inviting them to complete an interactive data collection form via the World Wide Web.
Results: A total of 1274 emails were mailed; 198 (15.5%) were returned by the mail server administrator due to an invalid address. The total response rate in 17 days was 478/1076 (44.3%); 16.5% of this group responded within 72 hours, 19.5% after the first reminder and 8.3% one week after the 2nd reminder. Raw data were electronically recorded in the spreadsheet. There was 0.02% duplicate and 0.04% incomplete or partial data entry.
Conclusions: Using the Internet for data collection using CGI script could be a fast and effective alternative to traditional medical surveys. Electronic data entry eliminates the human errors and enables tracking of users for longitudinal analysis.
Learning Objectives: understand the concept of web based medical survey data collection using CGI scripts
Keywords: Internet, Survey
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
Organization/institution whose products or services will be discussed: None
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.