ArticleTrials2022
How much is the lack of retention evidence costing trial teams in Ireland and the UK?
Article in Trials, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 11 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
11 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Trial Forge Guidance 5: ethical considerations in randomised Studies Within A Trial (SWATs).Trials · 2025Guideline
- Trial
- Trial
- The Influence of Relationships Within Behavioral Weight Management Interventions: An Overview.Obesity reviews : an official journal of the International Association for the Study of Obesity · 2026Review
- ATTITUDE - Addressing attrition in longitudinal cancer cohorts: an in-depth qualitative analysis of experiences and perspectives on participation in longitudinal studies among breast cancer survivors.Breast cancer research and treatment · 2026Observational
- Article
- Evaluating the use of SPIRIT on participant retention in randomised trials: Challenges in reporting and implications for practice.PloS one · 2025Article
- Article
- How do trial teams plan for retention during the design stage of the trial? A scoping review.Trials · 2023Article
- Article
- How do trial teams plan for retention during the design stage of the trial? A scoping review protocol.Trials · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundEvidence to support the use of many retention strategies in clinical trials is lacking. Despite this, trial teams still need to have some form of retention strategy in their trials to try and avoid high attrition rates. This study aimed to estimate how much this lack of retention evidence might be costing trials in Ireland and the UK.
methodsWe selected the top ten most routinely used retention strategies by Clinical Trial Units in the UK and made assumptions as to how each of these strategies was most likely to be implemented and the costs involved in doing this. We applied our costing model to a hypothetical trial scenario in both Ireland and the UK as well as to three published trial protocols. We developed the costing model and calculated the costs in Microsoft Excel.
resultsRetention strategies were often poorly specified, meaning we had to make assumptions about implementation and in some cases about the strategy itself. Based on our assumptions, some retention strategies can be extremely expensive; some of the costliest strategies included "data collection scheduled with routine care" (€900-€32,503.25), "a timeline of participant visits for sites"-with integrated participant reminder (€304.74-€14,803.70), and "routine site visits by CTU staff" and "investigator meetings face to face", both costing (€777.67-€14,753.48). Others such as "telephone reminders for questionnaire response" (€34.58-€568.62), "a timeline of participant visits for sites"-site reminder alone (€79.18-€112.23), and "targeted recruitment of sites/GPs" (€30-€1620) were less costly compared to the other strategies. DISCUSSION: The resources invested in the use of some retention strategies may outweigh known or imagined benefits on retention. Where benefits are currently unknown, evaluation should be a priority.
conclusionMore evaluation of the effectiveness and cost of trial retention strategies is needed to avoid widespread use of strategies that are both expensive and ineffective.
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What Socratic holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.