Web-Based Quality of Life Questionnaire Followed by Paper-Based Questionnaire for the Non-Responders: Daily Practice in Patients with Prostate Cancer

Abstract

Purpose: Patient-related outcome measures (PROMS) play an increasingly important role in the planning and evaluation of medical care. A high response rate is crucial to get a good view of the patient population. Quality of life questionnaires in oncology are important in order to evaluate the impact of the disease or the treatment of cancer patients and guide treatment decisions. The traditional way to collect data is a paper-based questionnaire sent by post. However, online questionnaires seem an attractive and cheap way to send a survey. In this study we describe our experience with the introduction of digital questionnaires in daily practice and study factors that affect the response rate. Methods: The study design was an observational cohort study of patients who had a localized prostate cancer and underwent a Robot Assisted Radical Prostatectomy (RARP) at our institute. Validated questionnaires were mailed to the patients before the RARP and subsequently, 6 months, 1 and 2 years after surgery. After sending twice a digital questionnaire and without any response, we sent the patients a paper-based questionnaire with a stamped return envelope. Results: The response rate was higher when a reminder paperbased questionnaire was sent to the patients who did not respond to the web-based questionnaire. Furthermore, the elderly patients respond significantly more often than younger patients to both questionnaires (web-based or paper-based). Age was the strongest predictive factor for response on quality of life questionnaires. The fact that the patient no longer came to our institute for follow-up had no negative influence on the response rate.